What’s funny is, I don’t think anyone really loves the Death Star as much as the filmmakers think.
Even Death Star 2 was generally disliked, and after ROTJ everyone seemed to be against more Death Stars. It popping up in the PT rolled eyes. Starkiller was universally despised, and I wonder if J.J. was expectiting it and purposefully left it out of marketing. But Disney just couldn’t help themselves with RO, could they?
I didn’t mind the plans showing up in the PT. It’s that erector set DS at the end of ROTS that’s pushing it. Even Lucas jokes on the commentary about the issue of it taking 20 years to build the thing.
I honestly don’t remember much criticism of DS II back in the day.