How can Luke Han and Obi Wan recognize that the ship is old? what make the Falcon different from other ships? if you count the Solo movie the ship was very new in there
Everything looked old in the OT, that was done by design. " She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts, kid."- Han I would guess in-universe , the ship looked big and ugly. Nobody liked the look of it, even Leia.
I think Luke was determined to act unimpressed no matter what the ship looked like. Solo tweaked him badly in the cantina and everyone loves taking a braggart down.
It wasn't a new, shiny, cool-looking firecracker. Certainly not like those wizard spaceships in the holos. It was a broken-down, worn-out bucket held together by duct tape and the Will of the Force. Or so Luke thought. He learned different pretty quickly, though, and gained respect for a unique bit of machinery.
It was obviously dirty and dented just from what we could see on-screen. I'm betting if we could see it better, it would also have panels that the paint didn't quite match up, leaking fluids, and obvious jury-rigged parts. To SW characters who knew ships, it would be like an old junker farm truck with rusty wheels, mismatched fenders, and bondo all over the sides.
I don't think Luke would be that bothered. He knows good ships and the Falcon wasn't one. They were paying 17 thousand for a flight on a ship that wasn't even worth that.
Probably in a similar way to how we on Earth can look at a sort of beat up car on and think, "Is that thing really highway safe? Will we even survive five miles in it?" At least that was the vibe I got from the scene. Also, Luke is meant to be someone who is passionate about flying so he most likely knows more about ships than the average person and can't resist critiquing the Falcon when he sees it.
Han is like Madmartigan from Willow, except instead of turning out to really be a great swordsman, it turns out his crappy-looking ship really is the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy.
Because at a glance, it looks like it won’t survive five minutes in space flight. He’s probably thinking Oh great, we’re gonna die. It’s probably why he was freaking out about the flashing light a bit later because as far as he knew, it was the ship’s way of saying “About to explode! About to explode!”
Now I don't know if it exactly applies to YT-1300 transports but in ANH and RO, you have stromtroopers talking about new versions of skyhoopers so you could imagine that ships have updates similar to yearly car models. Same as you can pick out an old car here (regardless of condition), it's not hard to imagine they can pick out an old starship.
There's a reason why Lucas had the Prequels showcase shiny and smooth starships. The Millennium Falcon in contrast looks dirty, has its paint completely faded away, and there are battle scars on its hull.
