I get it when it’s folks who were around for the original releases. You (I’m assuming) and I grew up with an OT box set. We first saw them in rapid succession and they’ve always seemed like parts of a whole. I imagine living through a three-year gap between installments gives you a much different perspective. I can definitely see how people might only dig the original, especially since it functions so well as a standalone story.
I had that same conversation with someone years ago about Indiana Jones. They grew up with a six hour film, just as you’re pointing out with Star Wars. It is indeed a very different deal when several years pass between films. Plus, those were formative years. You can change quite a bit from 15 to 18.
I didn’t care for Empire because I’d changed in those three years. Alien had become my go-to outer space film. It was much deeper and I connected with it much more.
The difference was much more pronounced with Return. By then it had been six years, I was in my twenties, working, paying rent, had bought a car, had a long term relationship, etc. I had no interest in a kid’s version of my beloved Star Wars from several years earlier.
Star Wars became the franchise to me. A great film that moved me all those years earlier and couldn’t be topped. Life had taken place between the films. Entirely different than a bathroom break between for the box setters of the 1990s.
To be clear; There is absolutely nothing wrong with discovering the OT as a finished entity box set. You get here when you get here.
This is a perspective that I (having seen the non-SE editions maybe once and then growing up with the SE VHS set before making gradual realizations about quality of the PT, the SE, and the OT over time) haven’t ever thought of before. Thanks for the enlightenment.