"Unreasonably deep" is a relative term. Certainly deeper than I care to go. But sure, it could be unreasonably deeper.
Every time I have used animation my approach has been to treat it as frosting to be used sparingly. As such I would be much more attracted to simple/supported modes (that someone else will be interested in keeping functional) than I would be to obsessing over physics realism. But I am also a UI caveman with no taste, so there's that.