"Protagonists are characters that move the story forward. If your character is merely reacting to the events around them, they aren't being good protagonists, they're being passive. Passive characters are very difficult to make interesting and it's really difficult to have an interesting story with a passive character."

This reminds me of the movie War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise, the number one complaint I heard from people was that he was just some dude that was having all this stuff happening to him and he was just there. Not instrumental in doing anything to solve the issues. The tripods were driving the story and he and his family along. I personally don't like Tom Cruise but love sci-fi and I could identify with a dude just trying to stay alive in that situation, and not everyone is always going to be the dude who solves stuff...but it does make it harder to connect with the story or the character. On that note I did like it. BUT I think it's his lack of driving the story that made so many people not like it.

I could have just said...YES THIS...and save a paragraph...but YES! THIS! To your point. haha