Reading other responses reminds me that one of the best pleasures for me of the Star Wars Special Edition playing at the Chinese Theater in '97 was taking all of my young friends, and friends' children, who had been too young to see the original in theaters. It was awesome. These kids who had seen Star Wars on TV dozens of times were blown away, and audiences night after night would cheer and laugh and applaud as though they'd never seen the film before.
Crappy revisions or no, I will always hold one fond spot in my heart for the special editions simply because of this particular theatrical run ... which really generated more audience excitement than any of the two or three previous Star Wars re-releases (none of which, btw, played at the glorious Chinese Theater).