Worst the original vs the remake — am I overthinking this? [v5]

Spent the last few weekends digging into this and the deeper I go the more questions I have. Mostly thinking out loud — feel free to push back hard. Posting this here because the relevant subreddit has gotten too noisy lately.

This came up at a meetup recently and the room was split, so curious what the broader community thinks. I tried three different approaches and none of them felt quite right.

I tried three different approaches and none of them felt quite right. Maybe an unpopular opinion but here we go.