To start off, I haven't really read all of the posts - mostly the OP's
To begin this discussion -
medium is a style, genre is a subject - anime is not a genre - it contains genre just the same as television or books do - animation would have to be the medium or more correctly, visual motion pictures would be the medium and anime would be a top tier level or branch of that medium right alongside live action drama or television
so to the OP, I would have to say that anime is only a branch of animation and if you do not prefer animation, anime as a result would not be liked by you
Secondly, take note that there are no more original stories now - everything has been used thousands of times, however, what can be understood is how each character type or story type is presented in style or in a timeline fashion which creates a form of originality, thus if you find that a particular anime draws upon past subjects to be unoriginal, understand that there is very little to no originality in a sense left to be had in any subject.
and for Evangelion - the story revolves around a number of children who each have experienced some form of trauma and now are put into situations in which they have to quickly mature so you can expect a character like Shinji to be critical of his position - to be pushed aside by an indifferent father and now to only be there because his father 'has a use for him'
. To understand why it is happening, you must put yourself in place of the character in question and think of how you'd react to that particular situation at that specific age, do not immediately write off a character because they do not relate to you
if you're going to look at anime, not as a whole but rather as a sub-medium style - find sites which you can peer through by genre - subject - i.e. western, psychological, action, comedy, etc. simply chose what you like and look through the choices - do not judge something as a whole based on one or two examples. While I admit that there is some anime out there that are really off the wall (no examples here since I judge based upon synopsi and images to learn if I might enjoy it) this does not equate to every sample to be horrible
maturity may not equate to being good it is simply put the age range that it would fall to and the most likely candidates who would understand it and/or find it interesting
childish may not always equate it to being a children's show- rather it could mean that it contains excess comedy and that those who review such items will label it as such due to their personal preferences
so, all in all, don't judge a work based upon small samples but judge based upon the whole, there are always diamonds amidst the coal - however, based upon Cowboy Bebop - as I understand it - is a series of separate stories in each episode that involve the same 4 and eventually 5 characters. so before you spout any criticism on a work simply from one or two episodes - at least watch it in its entirety before presenting criticism which is the whole point of working in media study - observe the whole and not entirely the individual - after all the otaku and fanboys and girls do not represent Japan's culture as a whole just as ghettos (mostly portrayed in media) and Hollywood modeltypes including junkfood such as McDonalds do not represent Americans as a whole
I know I wrote a lot and some may not be correct, but these are all my personal opinions of the matter at hand - but out of the matter at hand - do not judge me based simply upon this post
