[Nicolai P. Zwar]

It’s incomprehensible to me why Disney+ has opted to have only the theatrical release on their service, a narratively confused version.

Most definitely; it’s rare that a director’s cut improves this dramatically over the theatrical cut. Scott has been on record saying he regrets the theatrical cut and the scenes should never have taken out.

I originally saw the theatrical cut and thought it was “so-so”. It had some interesting moments, but it felt, as you said, confused. It was sometimes never clear why the characters did what they did.
A colleague told me to give the director’s cut a chance, it was so much better, so I did, and what can I say, I was in awe.
Much, much better film, everything fell into place here, it’s Ridley Scott’s nod to the classic Hollywood epics, particularly El Cid.

The original poster made the movie appear to be some kind of historical action film with Bloom as tough guy hero, and the theatrical cut at least tried to bend the movie there, when it was actually a large scale historical epic with a reluctant and thoughtful protagonist and well written side characters.