Why did the writers NOT use the Player Characters?

Yeah, essentially.

There are debates elsewhere about how much importance Ash truly has, but that does seem to be the main reason he's still around. The only other male player character they've done anything with is Gold/Jimmy/Ethan(?) in Legend of Thunder. The others have only been shown in the World of Pokemon segments, except for Hilbert and Hilda of B/W. It's a mystery that I feel will never truly be solved, but the origins lie in the decisions they made for AG.
 
It's easier to stick with the one character who they can keep a core personality, story and background for.

If you use the different PCs every saga, then they'll all need something different to stand out (at least, in my opinion) and quite frankly, I don't think they'd do it that well :p

Throw in the fact that the Anime is designed to appeal to children (they don't really care if older fans carry on, they know they'll get in a new audience of children every generation) and then you'll see that there's no need to change Ash because he's new and interesting for the intended audience, which is not us.

(Besides, its not like the player characters are brimming with personality in the games and would be interesting in the Anime.)
 
Laziness. Why create new character when you can just use the same old footage, same bland personality etc. and be done with it.
 
I think they feel it is more interesting to follow at least one of the same characters around follow on their journey for this long. That would be good if Ash didn't revert back to how he was when he first started his journey each time. Its like he forgets everything. Maybe they felt that if they changed characters to follow the game characters during each region, no one would watch..
 
Well let's put it this way, Takeshi Shudo acknowledged the show had gotten boring in Johto and wanted to bring in a new character to revive it.

Why take the risk of replacing Ash/Pikachu with Brendan? It was far more easier to bring in the main female protagonist instead since the games had never featured one from the start before. After May worked the writers decided to keep Ash around and do it a second time with Dawn.

However now that Hilda was ignored, I think the writers are changing their view. It wouldn't surprise me at all if next gen they do use both game protagonists or none at all.
 
Anime already used female player characters(being May and Dawn)for Hoenn and Sinnoh.Reason why same thing hasnt been done with males is because Ash is intended to be driving force and series mascot with anime revolving around his journey,being already successful and popular.

From story and marketing point its also far more easier to do just continuation of already established character story taking him further,since there already exists background and guidelines,which is in reality more intriguing than watching rehash of previous character journey,with new one leaving when writers just started to dive deeper into it.

As opposite of going through trouble of creating whole new story for each new protagonist,coming up with ways to make him different and stand out from his predecessor(which with current games and gyms as only viable quest isnt simply possible),creating new footage,hiring new voice actor etc,etc,etc.

Not to mention there always exist certain risk of new character not being received well causing drop in ratings,and since Ash is part of anime for almost 15 years being its icon, departure brings possible risk writers dont want to take.In other words they rather want to stick with something which was proven to work.

Personally,im of view how anime is already sticking too much with games taking away from unpredictability and uniqueness anime exclusive things and writers imagination could provide,with past sagas being more rich in that aspect.Constant replacing just takes away from identity and stable cast,replacing characters halfway developed while they could offer much more to show.
Thats why im grateful Ash is kept having at least one stable character with who is being done more,with new/fresh things being added to story following gradual progression.

Gliscor'd said:
Well let's put it this way, Takeshi Shudo acknowledged the show had gotten boring in Johto and wanted to bring in a new character to revive it.
Click to expand...

I dont remember he ever said such thing,he only mentioned how ratings started to drop deciding to add some change by replacing one of characters.Since he favored TR,female lead was axed instead.

Speaking of which only reason Johto failed were poor writing decisions for which mr.Shudo was responsible himself.Anyone noticed how quality started to improve in 5th season,after he left?
 
Because they're too lazy to take the comic book route, a.k.a alternate continuity, for the BW saga so it'll be a perfect excuse for reverting Ash back where he was in the first season.
 
Laziness i'd imagine. Easier to just keep Ash then to bring in someone new and create a new personality and team dynamic.
 
Well, my opinion on this, and it's just a guess;

Ash was a spurt of slight creativity, albeit that he's Red counterpart, his personality is extremely different and his design slightly is as well.
So, having a mascot that shows that they are showing what the Games could be like but- in Anime fashion, while displaying that they are not just following the Games entirely, it is not just a commerical; Ash is perfect for that purpose, in their minds. Just my fumbly opinion.

Why they kept him? That would mean writing up a whole new main Protagonist character sketch, as well as the new companions; really, as everyone said, they're too idle to scrap Ash and bother with that.
 
I get why they don't use the PC in the anime as main protagonist! Cause U can't make him super strong and let him win a league during one adventure! ! ! He needs time to evolve! Ash grew a lot from Kanto to Sinnoh! In Sinnoh he was an great adult trainer thinking with his own head and taking down Paul on his own! Now in Unova he got stupid again not Kanto stupid let's say Johto stupid! And he makes rookie mistakes!
So it's okay to stick with Ash for this 5 seasons, but he finally needs to win a league especially with such a big team with a lot of potential!

For the other PC it's really a shame for them not to appear in the anime they would be so great Rivals! At least make them have an special Like Jimmy had! But that's the writers choice! :( Brandon and Lucas would be amazing characters as well as Leaf and White!
 
Ash is the stand-in for the player character (originally Red, and others following), and they did use May and Dawn, plus Gold and Crystal (Marina and... I call him Ethan) in that Raikou movie.

Plus, resetting the show in that manner would mean even less continuity. Compare/contrast with all the seasons of Digimon.
 
I prefer they use the same protagonist, but it is stupid for ash to restart his training for every region. I know they do this to show off the local Pokemon more, but I do wish they'd go back to how they started Johto off, with him keeping his pokemon (no more of the stupid 'starting over with just Pikachu') and slowly casting aside the older Pokemon of his, but without him releasing them. Maybe even him switch out and use some older Pokemon (I'm sure his Bulbasaur would like that).


Aside from that rant of mine, I think it is better to keep Ash, for the sake of not alienating each era of the Show. Also, I'm sure you don't want future fanboy wars between Ash fans and other protagonist fans.
 
By having Ash make it to the top 16 instead of 3rd or something, they show courage and established reality in there fiction. A ten year old can't win on his first try in a sport that relies heavily on experience. By establishing this the writers had to stick by this there was no reason to end the story when there is money to be made. This pretty much trapped them. Because of the pace each generation was coming out Ash progressive was crippled so time wise Ash was good to replace but story line wise he still had a lot of training to do. Now that he has enough power to win a league some wonder if it even possible to replace him.

But to answer why not use player characters. In the games they are mimes, blank slates and that works with the game play as you have to choose your team yourself having character on tv that look the same might ruin that however they already used Ash May and Dawn plus there is the manga. Frankly I would prefer an original character.
 
For the first season ash was supposed to be the anime version of the generation 1 player character, however the creators had got too attached with him
 
Ash is based off of Red (a player character)- but eventually, he became so iconic himself that people began to believe that Ash inspired Red, and the rest of the series.

They can't replace Ash now; he and Pikachu have become so synonymous with the pokemon franchise that they'll just alienate the current fans and confuse people if they change it. When people see Ash and Pikachu, they immediately think Pokemon. If they use player characters, it's harder for viewers to become attached to silent, nodding people. Or if they do give the player characters personalities, they'll just have similar personalities as Ash anyway, which defeats the whole purpose of featuring new characters.
 
As for me, I'm going with the 'writers are being lazy' theory.

I mean, yeah - the show is targeted at kids, not us older fans. But if they want to make it new and all, why not reset it and reboot it? Keeping Ash and making him stupid again is one thing that we have to tolerate, but he kept the same Pikachu that knows the same moves from the previous series. And that itself is making things irony, cuz that Pikachu is the one that went through loads of battles and should have plenty of experience enough not to lose to anybody. But the writers make Pikachu lose to lousy rookie trainers as to make it seem 'fresh'? Then what about Ash? If they're keeping Ash, why not remove all memories and make it seem he's travelling in parallel worlds, if he's that iconic? The new audience might probably get confused whenever Ash has flashbacks of previous travels. I met some young kiddies who were surprised when they heard Ash had been around for 15 years. They're like, "wut?" "and he's STILL not pokemon master??" "HE'S TEN FOR 15 YEARS??!"

If the writers were going to target the new audience, why not start off fresh with a new character? If they're creative enough, they could give the characters different personalities. I know this sounds a lot like Digimon, but the leader Digi-boys were pretty much all the same, save for a few traits.

In Pokemon Adventures, they all gave the main player characters different personalities. Red? Gold? Ruby? Dia? Black? I know this is the manga, but seriously, I do hope the writers aren't stupid enough to neglect any potential.
 
Ever noticed how Ash tends to be dressed up in the boy players’ clothes Sinnoh onwards? I think Ash IS supposed to be the stand in for the player character. … (unfortunately)
 
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