Over-thinking things: Pokemon

Although I enjoy the games, I have to admit that there are things about the series that bug me. One of them is the cannon age of the player character: ten years old. This doesn't make sense, that a fifth grader is going on a massive journey all over the region(s) and no one bats an eye. Does. Not. Compute.

So, under the cut is my attempt to reconcile the protagonists' official ages with both the world shown and general human behavior.

( The horrible mistake of Red )