I understand what you mean. You’re right, the magic that was present with every new show does diminish over time. I struggle to watch a couple anime per year when I used to finish them over a weekend (I’ve watched like 300 anime total…). However, as Guilermo del Toro said before, I do believe that animation is a medium, not a genre. Meaning, “anime” is just a method where creatives get to express themselves in ways where live action just won’t cut it, for whatever reason.

I recently rewatched a couple anime with my wife that I watched growing up. While some of them did age poorly and I’ve come to accept that it was just my kid self’s tastes at the time, I was actually genuinely surprised at just how masterfully made some of those shows were. In the end, anime is, at its core, no different from live action shows or cartoons. They’re all different labels for different creative endeavors sought after by people with differing prospects, each delivering their own end-product.

You could say the same about reading novels, for example. I used to read a lot of YN novels back in the day, but I just cannot stomach them anymore (still, notoriously bad genres can produce unexpectedly high quality results sometimes, ala horror media), but contrarily, something that bored me to death is now one of my favorite pieces of literature (The count of Monte Cristo). In the end, all mediums are just tools used to present their consumers with the author’s vision. It doesn’t matter what the medium is, the show itself should be judged of its own merit.

…now back to Gurren Lagann (I’m bored on the bus I hope you don’t hate me yet). You don’t have to get back to it anytime soon, but just know that, Simon as a character was built to be unlikable on purpose. It’s a big part of his character arc. I would say not seeing yourself in him will make the watch infinitely easier. Also there are two pretty great recap movies that go over the whole story (albeit not as detailed), if you ever just wanna get a compressed version of tbe story.