Red doesn't do anything that Blue wasn't capable of, besides defeating himself. The only difference is that Red did it. In fact, there's a massive amount of apathy in the Pokemon world; Lance could have stomped Rocket at any time he chose. Red's particular talent is taking action, not necessarily actually being better than anyone else. Then you can take it beyond what's in the first game... it's not actually possible for 151 Pokemon to truly be all that was known. Known in Kanto, perhaps, but Johto is a hell of a lot older than 2 years, not to mention all the other regions. Those other Pokemon were always known to some extent. Red never truly caught them all, nor have any of the characters since, until god forbid the series ends and they don't make any more.