It's not like there's 30 stories tall monsters going around trying to destroy the world. Or that everything gets reset to primordial goo unless you happened to make friends with the creepy albino from down the street.
Right...I'll give Matou a higher chance of surviving in FSN than in NGE. At least in FSN, he had a 1:3 chance of surviving, 100% if it was UBW.
I disagree, mostly because the Angels are incredible jobbers and also because there's really nothing preventing Matou (who isn't stupid) from using reverse-logic on Gendou.
"If you don't pilot this thing, that monster there will crush you. You wanna die? No? Pilot it."
"Make it worth my while. Otherwise, I have no reason to, y'know, not wait until it has killed you all and then kill it."
And yes, Matou is enough of a bastard to know when he is of value to someone. In this case, it's as if Gendo told him "You are the only one who can pilot it and isn't chopped liver, so we can't really afford to kill you.". He's going to exploit the hell out of it, because he's just that kind of opportunistic mongrel.
Because, seriously. Whole base of trained military men, and they call a thin, wiry, spineless kid to pilot their giant robot? Matou would have to be a retard to not realize he's basically their only choice at the moment, and he WILL exploit it for all it's worth, because Gendou's threats are pretty damn immaterial.
He can point a gun at him... to make him go out and get beat to a pulp by an alien monster. Wait, what? It's something that can kill him already, so he might as well bluff his way, since he risks winding up dead either way.
Matou is a coward, yes, but he's hardly stupid. He's the type of cunning snake that only true cowards can be. That's bad for Gendo's scenario, really.