The GM has the power to present a heist, but unless the GM is really railroady, the players have the power to make it a ransom, a demolition job or just ignore everything and join the circus.
This doesn’t sound contradictory to “planning a heist”. I guess I just took it to mean that the setup was a heist and that the punchline was that they had little control over the tone during actual play. I feel like ransoms, a demolition job, or joining in the circus fall within the “heist” aesthetic and narrative.