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Have you tried DaVinci Resolve? It's not FOSS, but it is a pro-level After Effects replacement with much more reasonable terms.

DaVinci Resolve feels more like a Nuke clone; it's production film compositing, not the compositing-and-animation mix that After Effects is.

You can do most things AE will do with a combination of Natron and Blender.

You can't replace the huge template and plugin ecosystem of AE. That's what really drives the adoption.