The Good:
-Hayden as Anakin’s ghost. It doesn’t make sense for him to appear as an unscarred Shaw because he never looked like that.
-Cloud City windows. They put the city in Cloud City, making it feel more big and open.
-Victory Celebration. As much as I love Yub Nub, Victory Celebration is better. It’s more melancholic and subtle than the unhinged upbeat attitude of Yub Nub, but I guess that’s not relevant.
-Other planets celebrating. It makes the victory feel truly significant.
-Ewoks blinking. While not exactly something we desperately needed, it’s still a welcome improvement.
-The Sarlaac’s extra tentacles. Being CGI allows them to move much more, giving the creature a much needed sense of being alive.
The Bad:
-Greedo shooting. Now I don’t care about the intricacies of what this does to Han’s character. My problem with it is how ridiculous it is that Greedo could miss his target from a meter away.
-Jedi Rocks. Not only is it awful, but I love Lapti Nek.
-Not keeping the original versions around. They have historical value.
-The Sarlaac’s beak. Turns what was a unique creature into a generic one that looks too much like the space slug.
The Weird:
-McDiarmid as the Emperor in TESB. It’s way better than the original, who looks and sounds nothing like Palpatine, but he is wearing his RotS makeup rather than his RotJ makeup. More importantly, though, the way his hood is arranged isn’t mysterious enough. Adywan did a much better version.
-The extra rock in front of R2 when he’s hiding from the Jawas. I guess Lucas thought he wasn’t well hidden, but adding the rock just makes us wonder how he even got there.
-Jabba in ANH. While it’s nice seeing this deleted scene restored, but given that it was, you know, deleted, it’s role in the story is already fulfilled by Han’s encounter with Greedo.
-Luke reunites with Biggs. While I do think this scene should be in the movie, it doesn’t work unless you also include Luke’s goodbye to Biggs, which is already a good scene in its own right. Should’ve restored that instead of the Jabba scene.
-Pointless line changes. Why? But really, why?