UHD seems like a bit of a gimmic to me, but I can understand the appeal of 4k in general. It’s just still a tad too expensive right now for most people to upgrade to a 4K TV and 4K blu-ray player. Heck, I didn’t jump on the Blu-ray bandwagon until around 2012 when player prices started falling under $100 a piece.
It’s just such a shame streaming is slowly edging out physical releases. Video quality (and audio, in some cases) just isn’t up to par yet with physical media, at least from what I’ve seen on Netflix, Amazon, and YouTube. Internet speeds can absolutely nuke any and all enjoyment from watching a film the second it starts stuttering and buffering, then crushing the resolution down to 360p until it catches back up for 1080p.
My nightmare scenario is Disney deciding to sit on it until the winds are clearly blowing in the direction of downloads/streaming and physical media is declared dead (or at least on its way out) by the industry, and only then releasing a restored OOT you’d need to download/stream and would never be able to physically own a copy of.
I feel like it won’t come to that, though. They haven’t even released the unaltereds on regular blu-ray, and we’re about to hit that magic seven-year mark since the last revision of the SE anyway. If they wanted to, they could dip on a 1080p disc release now (or next year if they want to keep to the seven-year pattern although that’s probably been coincidence more than anything else) and simply wait until 2020 to dip again on 4k. It’s the UHD release that’s going to need added incentive for people to buy, and May 2020 conveniently coincides (more or less) with the conclusion of the sequel trilogy.
If they stick to the current plan, Ep9 hits theaters in May of 2019. They could put it out by itself and (and possibly in 4k as well, with TFA, RO and Han Solo also having been released on 4k in the meantime since they’re 100% owned by Disney). Then, a year later in September of 2020 they release the I-XI box set you have to buy in order to get the unaltereds in all their 4k hdr glory.
We don’t know what Lucasfilm/Disney has planned for 2020 in terms of a new movie, but presumably there will be one. Whether that movie is a May release or they revert to December, I think the I-IX UHD set is a likely possibility, either hitting stores in September the same day as that year’s movie or simply as part of the cross-promotion if they go with December.