I used to watch Return of the Jedi at least once a year, sometimes multiple times, starting in the 80’s when we taped it off TV. I took a break around the time of middle school and started up again after the Special Editions came out (after which I probably watched the complete trilogy once a year).
When I was a kid, we didn’t go to the theaters that often, but my parents would and it would be the defacto babysitting tape when I was watching my younger siblings.
I slowed down in the early 2000s and I probably have seen them the least often since Disney took over. The Last Jedi killed a lot of my enthusiasm for Star Wars in general for awhile, but not completely. I did see the ESB re-release in theaters in 2020.
I like just sitting down to a movie I know I will enjoy, rather than doing a research project where I nitpick all the changes on screen, maybe that’s odd to hear on a forum like this which was based on noticing these things (and changing them).
As for doing a marathon, I think that tends to make the experience less enjoyable rather than more, because whatever you watch at the end you are going to be really tired for, and you don’t have a chance to let it really sink in. So ROTJ is going to suffer the most in those kinds of binge sessions. I have only once ever done it where I tried to watch all Star Wars movies “in order.” At my sister’s house we started in the morning with Episode I and we had breakfast, lunch and dinner at the appropriate times. People came and went (some friends showed up only for the OT). That was a long day. If it had been done a decade later to include the sequels (and/or “Star wars stories”) I would have refused, or only showed up for part of it… that’s just too much.
I wouldn’t even sit through a LOTR marathon (better to split it up over multiple nights). Each to their own, maybe I’m not the right age anymore to do that sort of thing. 6 hours of straight watching anything is hard to do, even if it’s stuff you love.
I’d much rather watch one (or at most 2) movies a day and spread it out over a weekend (or two) or even a week. It’s tougher to get adults from different households to do anything that dedicated together (even before the pandemic). If you can though, good luck!
I’m with Nilbog in that certain movies I can catch it mid-way through and will stay till the end, even though I didn’t plan on it. Most movies (in general) I will just turn it off and resolve to see it from the beginning (and often put that off for months or even years). Not so with ROTJ, most of all of the classic films. If it were the prequels I might watch the fight scenes, and that’s probably it. Still, over the years I’ve probably seen Episode I more times than I’d care to admit even though it’s my least favorite of the George Lucas ones.
With ROTJ probably the more I see it, the more I enjoyed it, but ROTS I actually saw too much in the time between its release in theaters and the time it came out on DVD. Even though I said I enjoyed it, I had no desire to watch it for years after that time. I re-watched it again more recently on the blu-ray set from 2011 and I was amazed once again how jarring the change was from the first act to the second (I was re-watching the entire series, about one movie a week in 2018 iirc).
As cool as it would be to do a fan-edit, I think it would possibly ruin a movie for me to watch it that closely and that often in such a span of time. But maybe actual editors don’t feel that way.
When things open up again, I would love to see the classic Trilogy in theaters again, and even though I might make an exception to my “no marathons” general rule. 😉