Yeah, Ash has matured quite a lot. And according to some fans he does actually have an adequate arsenal of Pokemon that could actually be tournament worthy. Now if he would only evolve that damn Gibble.

While he does lose quite a bit he does have a couple of major wins under his belt too. People tend to forget he is the Orange League Champ and Battle Frontier champ.

Yeah. It's annoying how often he refuses to let his Pokemon evolve (Yet, ironically, his fully evolved Pokemon tend to have the biggest losses under their belt, such as his Torterra never winning a battle after evolving), but it's a staple of his character, so I don't really have much issue.

Also, you know how well off Ash is when it takes a freaking Darkrai to be the reason why he can't win the Sinnoh league.

Anyway, it's hard to take the Orange League win seriously since it was just a filler arc (Still, it was cool, most especially seeing Taurus and Snorlax battle), but him winning the Battle Frontier was awesome.

Oh, and Gible? Please. Didn't it take Cyndaquil 200 episodes to evolve? I think we'll be waiting on Gible for a while.

I've been watching a bit of Black and White after having not watched since the Kanto region (although I did keep up with the movies). It's not terrible like people say, it's just not a very ambitious anime.

Ash isn't a terrifically exciting characters. His trademarks are still his compassion and justice, his competitiveness, his enthusiasm and sad to say, his err, lack of intelligence. He's not a bad character by any means, and he shines in the movies themselves. Overall he makes a great audience surrogate, and I appreciate that about him.

Iris and Cilan are decent companions. Cilan is no Brock, but he fills that spot competently enough. Iris really channels Misty, from how annoying Misty was initially, to even having a baby Pokémon to carry around in the form of Axew.

Team Rocket has surprisingly become competent. They never "blast off" anymore, and almost all their plans succeed unless they directly involve Ash and co. They've become more dignified villains in that respect.

As always, the main stars of the show are the Pokémon themselves. The anime has propelled Oshawott to the top of my favorites list, and Snivy is freaking awesome too. If anything the anime has succeeded in making the individual Pokémon pretty likable, far more than the humans themselves.

Overall the anime makes for a fun watch when you're just looking for something to spend time on. In that respect, it's become like the Simpsons or Spongebob for me, something fun to tune in to when channel surfing, but not something I'd cry over missing.

Yeah. I like his outlook of adventure though. New region, hey, time to get new Pokemon. He keeps Pikachu as his uber-bro sure but I can respect that he prefers to start from scratch entering every new region rather than rely on his veteran Pokemon. Essentially he is challenging himself.

Also Darkrai guy was a douche. I mean Darkrai and Latios. What the hell?

My problem with the anime is the same one I had with the Simpsons. There are glimpses of amazing characterization and story arcs, but it's muddied throughout by the staff having to fill out a story that has no real end, so they just have to write episode after episode each week.

I'd bet if they took the critical character and plot episodes of Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh, and collected them all, they'd probably barely have 150 episodes on their hands (Out of 750+).

The problem is that he still has Pikachu, presenting two problems.
1. Pikachu has to weaken significantly at the start. It's kind of ridiculous to have Pikachu take down a Dragonite to having it unable to defeat an Elekid.
2. If Pikachu doesn't lose all it's strength between seasons, you're presented with Ash basically having a panic button (Such as during Johto, where Misty actually called him out on keeping his Kanto starters and Pikachu when he first entered Johto).

And yeah. That was total BS. Really pissed me off because that was Heracross's first appearance since, like, Johto (I don't remember if he appeared in the Battle Frontier).

It would have been awesome, undoubtedly. Sadly it's not that kind of show, but rather the kind that just has to keep churning out episodes. Nothing much the writers can do in that sense, I guess.

Yeah, they really can't do much of anything. And as a painful result, the anime doesn't do much of anything, either.
I understand it's a vehicle for moving games, but the issue arises that "What does it do when the games are out and released?"
We saw in the time between Johto and Hoenn that it just sat and stagnated in mediocrity, but I do wish that when it's not being a Pokemon of the Week vehicle for the current game, that it could do something with any semblance of a story.

BW has gone in the right direction by altering status quo and removing a lot of the running gags that have staled over the years (Most notably around TR, removing Blasting Off and Wobbufett, in addition adding a partner for Ash who isn't a Contest Runner, and (Sad as I am to see it go), Brock and his flirty ways). Perhaps with X and Y coming later this year the Anime will adopt a better prominence on story and plot over a showcase for a new mon of that gen.

Do you think it is ever possible to replace Ash and Pikachu as the protagonists of the series?

Nope.
There's a reason why there are only 26 Chronicles episodes.
Either there just isn't an audience or the writers have no interest in making them.
I don't think we'd be replacing Ash anytime soon.

However, because Ash has so obviously made it clear he's not Red, and previous game protagonists Ethan, Lyra, Brendan, and Lucas have cameoed (With May and Dawn being main characters), I do wonder if we'll ever see the game's Red appear...

Nope. I could see them doing lots of cooler more mature themed side stories in the manga but Ash is the face of the anime and Pikachu is still the most recognizable Pokemon of the franchise and since the anime is the one constant source of media in between games, they can't really make so many changes without throwing off the more hardcore ilk and apparently there are more than a few of those. When OLM did that 4-5min anime trailer for Black and White 2, people were raving like crazy how awesome that would be as the new anime standard.

But yeah, Pikachu's level moderation feels very forced every new season. But its kind of like (bad analogy I know) Superman in the Justice League.

Also to add, Episode N seems like it takes a more serious tone in storytelling. Specifically N and Colress being the centrepiece. This might be the series that actually ties into a movie (Extremespeed Genesect)