There's a lot of us that think quite highly of it now.
And I think people are forgetting how much complaining was done for SC and BC&SL.
Very much so. People were bummed when MP left for sure, but I also think there was an implicit (sometimes explicit) feeling that MP's departure would lead to less qualities that people were frequently complaining about at the time. Aggressive vocals, overly heavy songs, etc. I remember the overwhelming sentiment on here was that they were "righting the ship" with ADTOE.
Now there seems to be this attitude on here that people being excited about Portnoy coming back is to Mangini's detriment, but I don't think that's the case at all. If anything I see a large amount of concern from fans on here about Mangini songs being forgotten in setlists. For the most part, I would say the last decade was pretty successful for Dream Theater and I don't think people are going to forget about a whole quarter of their career all of a sudden.
Ummmmmm..... off the top of my head, I know I heard a RED song (BMUBMD), several Rush songs (TLG, AFtR, BW, TT), a Yes track (ALLB), a Satriani-style solo piece (outro solo to ANB), a Megadeth/Metallica track (FItL), and a Deep Purple track (VK) on those albums. Maybe there’s some others I’m missing, too.
This. Maybe they broadcasted it less with Portnoy out of the band, but their knack for taking various influences from different bands did not change at all compared to when Portnoy was there imo.