英语the surface of the water looks much like it did before the disaster!解释为什么用did?

虽然一定是有上下文有语境,但是本句算是意思很明了的了：
水面看起来与灾难前几乎一样
这里did是在比较句型中一个经典的省略用法,除去省略后的原句应该变成：
The surface of the water looks much like what it looked like before the disaster!
------------------------------ ````````````````````
水面 看起来非常像 它在灾难前看起来的那样
从中文的直译可以看出语意复沓严重,因而一般就把what 和like省掉了,然后用did直接代替了looked这个谓语
有的时候,甚至连谓语都省了,试试看你能不能够省略改写下面这句：
His song doesn't feel as much like a story as what my song feels like.
His song doesn't feel as much like a story as my song (does).does可要可不要