[ProDigit]

Hey, not all anime is bad! A lot still does speak to the X-generation. But in order to maintain a sense of imagination and realism to the anime, that X-generations want, they'd have to spend lots of $$$ in the creation of it.
I know I'm going to step on a lot of people's toes when I say this, but I feel some of it has to be said:

One for instance, get rid of fillers
two, make a continuous story, not separate small stories,
three, know what you're making. Not some half assed anime where magic is the only answer to our lack of imagination
four, make it belief worthy enough to watch
five, spend enough investments in research and development, as well as fantastical engineers, that out of their minds invent scenario's, sceneries, artifacts, weapons, tools, lifestyles, cultures & traditions, different from our own.
If you look at star trek for instance (the TV series), they spent a lot of time developing non-existing technologies at the time, with some base in science, some of them now turned into reality (like tablets), others perhaps never (like transporter/beamers/portals, laser guided guns, tractor beams, warp (hyperdimensional) drive, or even the Star wars Jedi laser swords; time travel, gravity or photon bombs, gravity drives, genetic mutations through existing radioactive materials or chemicals, etc....).
All of these took a lot of engineers, and science majors to invent these things, that later on where adapted to all kinds of other movies, who literally became watered down versions of the former.

A lot of people have mentioned in this thread that x generation is less and less the target audience; which is true, and most of those that buy anime, buy it for their kids, not themselves.
I also know that in Japan, people are more tolerable for 'lousy' movie making; as where in the western world 'perfection' is high on the bar.
An easy example is many of the japanese anime, that's been re-edited or dubbed in USA, is mostly the best of the best of the anime out there (no teardrops falling from someone's head when they feel funny, no laughing and playing happily after killing an enemy; but more realistic in psychology).
Eg: Macross. Out of all the eps, Macross Plus must be the best of them all; they're also most oriented towards USA>
Same with Street fighter 2v, then again, street fighter zero was dubbed and totally crappy.

I've noticed that the Japanese target audience is mostly about 'funny', and cute, where as the western is more about technology, modernization, and realism.

I'm from the western world, and view with eyes of such. So you'll understand my background.

It's true that some Japanese people may get offended with what I say, and they can be perfectly happy with their puri-puri happy clappy, late evening, magical girl anime; and say if we want anime like this, we should make it; and I fully agree with you. Americans, though they're not so strong in making good cartoons, should do more of that.
I just wonder if there might not be any Japanese left, that still desire to see some great western-style animes; as I get the distinct feeling some are telling me, that anime is mainly to feed the Japanese culture only, and the rest of the world should be happy to get the leftovers.
Without knowing exactly what kind of people Japanese adults are, I think it's a valid question to ask...
What do most Japanese adults (men) like to watch?

Oh, btw, don't get me wrong,
Japan isn't the only one who adapted from a great story line and lots of eps, to a (bi)weekly short story eps.
In USA a lot of the Hollywood episodes are also mainly stories on their own, without a real storyline.
And also a lot more like 'friends' which IMHO is just a waste of time (seeing 5 couples spend time in their appartments or in the cafe).