>>54366266>he's nothing. Ash is a nothing character.By Shudo's own design. Old news I know, but the TRio being way more interesting was also by design.
It's just unfortunate that the heads at the time seriously thought, "well, we CAN'T just drop Ash, he has too much history!"
And now look at Horizons, where Liko, Roy, and Dot are all blooming flowers. Dot especially would have just been a Brock-level flat character in the Ashnime, and we would have had Nidothing go all the way to maybe halfway through the series before Ash learned it was Dot.
Even Liko, the one a number of people bemoan for being too passive has started being more active, and is heavily implied to finally get her own shoes by the Kabu and Hattena episodes upcoming. If I didn't see Dot go from people's worst character to some's favs I never would have believed it otherwise.
Also speaking as a former fanfic writer, Ash is so generic he's actually HARDER to write accurately for his shifting/lack of personality. It's not surprising so many self-inserters go the easy route of making him a gary stu, because doing it properly is difficult to pin down his character. 