Sailor Moon isn't the leader of the Sailor Scouts for no reason, being notoriously overpowered, able to move faster than light, destroy realities and literally scream her enemies into submission. However, when it comes to Magical Girl franchises, there's another series that produces some fierce fighters who just might be able to take her down: Pretty Cure. With 17 separate series, and over 48 different Cures, Pretty Cure takes the fights of Dragon Ball Z and mashes them together with transformations and magical shenanigans for a surprisingly effective formula. So naturally, the question on everyone's minds is -- who would win in a fight?
Salior Moon is a surprisingly tough customer, able to dish out huge damage and heal any damage taken. Against this combination, most Cures don't stand a chance. Pretty Cures usually get one, maybe two seasons to learn and hone their abilities, whereas Sailor Moon has a manga, two anime and several stage shows that all feed into her power levels. So who could even come close to matching her? Firstly, let's assume the characters are fighting at some point after their series ends, giving them all the powers and abilities they've gained throughout their adventures. Likewise, it's a one-on-one fight, not team vs team. Lastly, these are the Cures most likely to stand up against the Moon Princess and survive, not necessarily win.
Yukari Kotozume, AKA Cure Macaron, our first candidate, is Sailor Moon's polar opposite -- innately competent at almost every skill she tries, Cure Macaron is as finicky as a cat, and as mysterious as one too. She's able to make great use of her Kirakiraru to create finely crafted constructs, and uses her Macaron Julienne to slice and dice opponents. Together with the rest of her team, she even helped to reconstruct the Earth after it was destroyed by Elisio.
If the whole team was together, it'd be a much fairer fight but, as it is, the key point in Macaron's favor is her competency and ability to deceive, listen, learn and discern weaknesses in others. She might be able to mentally defeat Sailor Moon with ease, or use her ability to scratch creatures under the chin to induce bliss as an offensive tactic to get the Scout's guard down, but it's unlikely she'd be able to defeat her alone. Still, her cat-like potential to simply break Sailor Moon and leave for something that looks more interesting shouldn't be underestimated.
One of the OG Cures, Nagisa Misumi, otherwise known as Cure Black, is by far the strongest Cure in terms of sheer power. Black is primarily a brawler, with her only magical attacks being finishers. As soon as she gets in close to Sailor Moon, her unrelenting punches could easily overwhelm the Sailor Scout, and she's used enough to fighting superpowered opponents that she doesn't even need to be paying attention to deliver a butt-whooping.
But while Black tends to get stronger when mad, she fights through brute strength and has no individual ranged attacks. Overall, taking her partner White away severely hampers Black's ability to fight, and even transform! If the fight started while the two were still civilians, the best she could do would be to run away. While she might be able to overwhelm Sailor Moon with sheer strength (since Sailor Moon is not a close-combat fighter), there's no guarantee she'd get close enough to land a hit.
Alice Yotsuba, AKA Cure Rosetta may well be one of the most powerful Cures in history, second-to-none in hand-to-hand combat. She's so powerful, in fact, that she only gains one magical attack! The rest of her abilities are primarily defensive in nature. The reason for that is simple. The girl was a black-belt before she found out she'd be saving the world. Once given a Cure's default super-strength, her technique takes her from "dangerous" to "deadly." If she manages to get close, she can easily get Sailor Moon into a submission hold.
But the biggest reason she'd win over Sailor Moon is the unique set-up of a one-on-one battle. Of all the Pretty Cures, Rosetta is the most comfortable fighting independently. Since Sailor Moon's powers are mostly ranged, she could easily use her Rosetta Reflection or Rosetta Wall techniques to block incoming attacks, and fire them back at Sailor Moon. Remember that one magical attack from before? Rosetta Balloon is a ranged attack as well, giving her a way to actively fight back even if the Sailor Scout does her at a distance. Furthermore, she can even combine her abilities, making her a perfect blend of offense and defense.
