It seems to me your missing the most important point. The Japanese can draw realistic oriental looking characters. So why don’t all character in all anime look like that?
I too think Osamu Tezuka’s to blame.
Most anime characters don’t look like realistic anything. Nor do most cartoon characters in general. They are all very stylized.
Since the anime mentioned in here is Bleach, I thought I would bring up as an interesting comparison the live action musical based upon it. You can see here a comparison of the live, Japanese actors to their drawn counterparts, and the actors without makeup. I found it an interesting comparison.
