I’ve always thought they changed the recording setup and technique as everything became more advanced and of course they had a significantly higher budget and more time. Personally I’ve always liked the tinnier sounding '77 Vader just as I prefer him more mysterious and not the typical Vader people think of. I LOVE how they made Brock Peters sound in the radio drama and there are many days where I even want to say out loud I prefer that version…

There are many reasons why I always tell people the 97SE mix was the last time SW ever sounded good and this is yet another reason. In 1997 they added some new effects for the new stuff but largely just brought the original 4 track design into the 5.1 environment, added mono mix fixes and tweaks to try and make a fantastic 5.1 experience that stayed relatively faithful to the original track design of all three films. Then in 2004 they took this work and pissed all over it by inducing many changes, EQ tweaks, new changes on top of old ones, voiceover dubs, flopped surround channels on ANH, messing with the music levels and adding an unnecessary EX phantom rear center. Then these got bumped up to 6.1 for the 2011 BDs with some issues fixed but even more awful new changes added.

You can put on D+, BD or 2004 abominable DVDs and then play the 97SE LD ac3 and just watch people’s minds get blown. Sure the 97SE 5.1 isn’t always fully historically accurate but they did an amazing job for the time and it’s got some really intense LFE usage which must give an idea of the 1977 70mm baby boom experience people had.