doubleKO said:

I agreed with S_Matt about this, not from the point of view of what was or wasn't originally intended but whether it works for the climax of a fantasy story.

I think if the change had been handled differently it would have worked better (at least for me). It's still deep enough in Empire and worked well enough. By the time Return was released the series had lost a lot of its harshness.

In Star Wars we had burned bodies, mass murder (Alderaan), torture, severed arms lying on the floor, untrustworthy hired pilot, etc. Those elements were either castrated or g-rated as the series progressed and I think that hurt the OT overall. There was real danger in Star Wars. The lack of of any real danger in Return made me want to walk out of the theater in 1983.

For me, the change didn't work. For a most others, it worked well and still does.