I've heard that Ridley was busy shooting another film when the Final Cut was in production so he wasn't that involved personally. Most of the improvements were pre-approved in bullet point form, meaning the editor probably did much of what we both like about it in advance and Ridley was there in person only to supervise the color grade and to sign-off on changes.

Personally, when it comes to revisiting revered classics many years later, I think directors (even good ones) should focus on correcting obvious technical errors like matte lines in effects, muffled audio or the proverbial boom mike at the edge of a shot. They need to resist the urge to make non-technical stylistic changes like color grading or noise reduction (looking at you James Cameron). Things like adding back cut shots or recutting scenes to change pacing need to be carefully considered and only done when the original cut was obviously in error or not what the director intended at the time - perhaps due to not having time/budget to reshoot, overdub or being overruled by the studio or producer.

When a film has become a classic, and is of historic importance, it should be respected as an artifact of its time and a snapshot of a director's abilities, style and tastes at that point in their development. They should be thankful for the opportunity and stick to making it what their original intent was then, not what they'd do if they made it now. Otherwise, they're quickly on a slippery slope toward a strange stylistic hybrid between then and now.

James Cameron's Aliens "Directors Cut" is an example of a mixed bag. Fixing the VFX matte lines is a definite plus but the excessive noise reduction sucks all the texture out of the image. Adding back the lengthy sequence at the beginning of the film showing Newt and her family encountering the Aliens on the mining colony removes much of the suspense and mystery, making the film worse IMHO. Cameron cut that scene after test screenings for good reason which makes the addition feel like it was motivated by the studio's desire to market the Director's Cut with "X Minutes of New Footage!".

The same is true of the entire ~20 min French colonist digression in the Apocalypse Now Director's Cut. It's mildly interesting from an historical point of view but it brings the entire movie to a grinding WTF halt. It's a clear example of putting a mistake back into a film that should never have been in the script in the first place. The 'Newt's Family' scene in Aliens is just unnecessary but it was probably hard to know that until seeing a rough cut.