Exactly right, Wayne. The Common Updater literally updated your driver to the latest version to make sure it was compatible. The new drivers don't require it.
On the consumer side, the latest drivers include an app (on Mac) called Download Navigator, which will also update your driver (from the Epson servers) along with any other Epson supplied software that came with your printer.
For the Pro side, if you have version 6.60 or version 8.63/8.64 or higher (depending on model) then you will see no benefit from the Common Updater. (8.63/8.64 is the update to 6.60 for Lion and the number depends on the model you have). Not all Epson sites appear to have the new drivers yet, but I imagine it won't take long. 6.60 is still Lion compatible. There's no Download Nagivator for the Pro models and there is a known issue that allowing the Apple auto-update to update a Pro driver can cause it to fail (and require you to delete, reinstall, etc as discussed in this and other threads).
I haven't seen any info as to whether the 8.63/8.64 drivers resolve this, but I know the issue is being looked at by Epson and Apple.