Definitely good that they took care of that lightsaber effect. That always bothered me as well. It looked like it was holding one of those glowing glass rods (the one's that really only glow from the tip...like non-bending fiber optics).
I like the idea of redoing the eye, however, I don't like how the new one looks. It looks too cat-like. If it looked more like the original, but was redone as digital, I think it would have looked good.