Star Wars (A New Hope) - man, I haven’t seen the episode IV subtitle since the 2006 GOUT discs came out. The main title recedes ridiculously fast, it almost made me laugh!
Even at lowly 1080p the new Disney+ version looks really nice. A MASSIVE improvement over the clips I’ve seen from the dvd or BD versions.
As I said, I’ve not watched any of the SEs since the days of VHS, and I’ve never watched any SE iteration beyond the 1997 cuts. For the most part, I dislike the changes and find them obtrusive and distracting. I will admit I actually like the Biggs scene in the hangar and the new fix to Obi-wans lightsaber. Everything else sucks.
Of all things, the change I actually dislike the most is the changes to the battle of Yavin. I’m a huge fan of models and miniatures, both in film effects and as a hobby in real life. Seeing all the beautiful artistry replaced with crummy 90’s cgi was just painful.
But despite the hindrance of being the SE, it’s still such a great film. It’s been very fun watching this from an “in-universe” historical perspective seeing the old republic fall, the rise of the empire, and all the little details in the films about such things. I think Solo and Rogue One do a fantastic job bridging the gap between the PT and the OT.
It’s also been fun seeing how the little details in the PT and those two Disney films line up with the backstory given through the dialogue of ANH.
It has also put something into perspective that’s always been there but didn’t really register before. The empire has been in control for about two decades, give or take. Which is long enough to feel like “forever” to many people but it’s still relatively new in terms of massive empires and there’s lots of little details pointing out how they don’t have complete and total control yet and they are still struggling to get it.
I dunno, it’s just been interesting watching the galaxy go from long peace to this huge civil war to a totalitarian dictatorship and how even under the empire the turmoil is still bitter and ongoing. Anakin never achieved his goal of ending the conflict, which I think will give even more impact to his plea for Luke to join him and rule the galaxy as father and son when I watch ESB in a few days…