Nathan Fillion defends Mal Reynolds from Han Solo

Listen to the Geeks Vs Nerds debate from HAL-CON, where our own Dave Bradley tries valiantly to stick up for Han Solo despite a certain celebrity phone-in...

Who's the better vampire slayer - Buffy or Blade? Who's most likely to traumatise a child - Chucky or Pennywize? Ripley versus Sarah Connor? Smurfs versus Fraggles?

These are the kind of debates we love to have here at SFX , and we're obviously not alone since the gang at Geeks Versus Nerds has been performing a comedy improv-style debate show live at Jokers Comedy Club each month in Halifax, Canada. And they took over the HAL-CON convention last Saturday afternoon for the last of their shows, and kindly invited our editor-in-chief Dave Bradley along to take part. He went all the way to Nova Scotia to stick up for Han Solo in the ultimate rogue smuggler debate...

... and found that he couldn't compete when a certain actor called author PJ Haarsma during the show to contribute his own defence.

You can listen to the whole hilarious thing thanks to the latest Geeks Versus Nerds podcast here (caution - contains strong language right from the start - although the content warning itself is funny):

Click here to visit the Geeks Versus Nerds podcast

In addition to the packed Geeks Versus Nerds events (did you notice the 111-decibel shouting?) HAL-CON featured guest appearances from Star Trek alumni Denise Crosby and Walter Koenig, Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy from Mystery Science Theater 3000 and many more. Dave Bradley also hosted a fiendishly difficult SFX quiz on the main stage. The Halifax sci-fi fans made us really welcome and SFX is pleased it was a roaring success - fingers crossed for more fun next year.

Thanks to Kell Harker for the pictures. To find out more about the format of Geeks Versus Nerds, you can read an interview with the producer and host Andrew "PigMonkey" Dorfman here on SFX from earlier in the year. For details of PJ Haarsma's books, The Software series, visit his site here . The official website of the HAL-CON convention is here . More photos and a full report on the event to come - watch this space.

SFX Magazine is the world's number one sci-fi, fantasy, and horror magazine published by Future PLC. Established in 1995, SFX Magazine prides itself on writing for its fans, welcoming geeks, collectors, and aficionados into its readership for over 25 years. Covering films, TV shows, books, comics, games, merch, and more, SFX Magazine is published every month. If you love it, chances are we do too and you'll find it in SFX.