By all accounts at the time, LFL needed TPM3D to do a minimum of like $20mil which it barely did that, if I recall... I think it's tough to look at TPM3D and say it did well.
Star Wars is used to re-releasing stuff, and people ******* to it, and they clearly didn't for this. I think they just thought we'd put it out, and everyone would come back and watch. They've really hung onto the notion that TPM was a great film... I don't think you could tell them any different, and then last February they got a wake-up call. I'd not be shocked, at all, if Lucas maybe sped up his retirement plans based on that, just a little bit, in the back of his head.
He's very unapologetic, not that he needed to, but I feel like he honestly didn't believe the criticism of the prequals. He figured they were every bit as good, or better, than the OT, in his mind, and he wasn't really into hearing anything to the contrary.