Wazzles said:
The original negative are conformed to the SE, so even if it is the SE it can be called the “original elements”.

Except it would be the Special Edition in 4k, and large sections of the theatrical releases would be missing and/or altered.

Wazzles said:
That also isn’t as nearly a high-profile a restoration that requires careful timing and consideration.

It was a very high profile restoration. But I’ll give you a more difficult example: The Godfather negative was missing 20 minutes and in such bad shape that Harris and his team stood ready to halt the scan at every moment for fear that frames would be ripped apart. That restoration took 18 months (for both films altogether, IIRC).

Again, 5 years is way more than enough time to come to the realization that Disney has no plans to release the OOT now or ever. It takes a very important person to greenlight and assign the funds for restoration projects. The only people with that power are Lucas, the execs that are loyal to him at LFL, and the absolute top top people at Disney. Mike Verta has connections at LFL and it took him a long time to even get an appointment, and apparently his pitch was dead on arrival. I don’t want to speak for him, I know he posts on here or used to, but that was my impression.

Lucas hired Kennedy and all the rest at Lucasfilm. He has worked with them and he knows their minds. Given what we know about how he made the prequels and the sycophants he surrounded himself with over the years, there should be no doubt that LFL is populated with people who are very loyal to George and like-minded. Our only hope was that the Disney execs would override the LFL lifers, but that seems to have been misguided. Given what we have learned about other restoration projects over the years, it’s doubtful if the Disney suits are even aware of the alterations in the first place.