I agree that it would not be a very interesting tv show if pikachu won every battle. But loosing to starter pokemon is ridiculous. The tradition of Japanese anime is for the protagonist to loose a few battles until they manage to find a way to defeat the new enemies. But those enemies grow with the character. You don't see Naruto having trouble with people who are on the same level as the people he faced in the first season, you see him having trouble with Madara. You don't see Natsu (Fairy Tail) having problems with a Vulcan in the new series, you see him fighting a freakin dragon. Similarly Pikachu should be being defeated by people with Dragonites, or other strong final evolutions, not the new region's beginner equivalent of the same pokemon he has beat a hundred times by now.