When I got my 2016 LC with 60k miles and did my first oil change at 65k miles, I used the MotivX tool to get the plastic oil filter off, and let’s just say it was a butt pucker situation where the filter housing cracked at the ribs and it was very close to me not being able to get the housing off. After that, I threw it in the trash and used the aluminum Venza filter after that. Plastic is probably okay if you are torquing it to spec yourself, but if anyone else works on your car (even dealers) there’s too much risk of not being able to get the filter housing off.
To me the plastic vs. metal debate is all about price cutting from Toyota. They may charge more for a replacement because it may be lower batch numbers, but I doubt the metal is cheaper to produce.
I have not heard of one instance where the block was damaged from cross threading the metal one onto the block. In fact, even if I tried, I don’t think I could purposefully cross thread it due to the tapered design.
I would use the OEM regular filter and not the TRD since they can’t seem to cut the TRD filters at a flat angle…