Capt. Mal vs. Han Solo

Over at the SyFy mecca Blastr, they have a blog up talking about a nerd argument, pitting fictional character versus fictional character, beloved icon versus beloved icon, smuggler versus smuggler. I'm talking about Captain Malcolm Reynolds of Serenity (Nathan Fillion) versus Han Solo, Captain of the Millennium Falcon (Harrison Ford). Now, usually, I don't put much stock in such debates; no one wins, and it just seems so lame, but, it can make for a fun debate, and I'm curious what the peeps think about this one.

So, on one hand we have Mal Reynolds, Captain of Serenity. It's tough because he was on a TV show, and only one movie, compared to Solo's three movies, but one thing you can say about Mal is that he is always the same character; he is the rogue smuggler, or as he is described in the pilot to Firefly entitled Serenity, "a hero in a den of thieves." He has no problem killing people if they threaten his crew, which Blastr's article states, and there is never any debate that Mal shoots first, and often.

Of course, you also have the Scruffy-looking Nerf Herder. He is the quintessential scoundrel and rogue, and is one of the more beloved characters in all of Sci-Fi. He doesn't have a big crew, just his faithful side-kick Chewbacca. The character is known to be a good smuggler, and often only does things for the money, which is a good sign. He finally go a bit soft by the time the Ewoks showed up, but even in his soft times, he helped blow up a death star ... again.

So, I like them both, and I would've liked to have seen more of both characters, but sadly, there will be no more of either. I think since Mal was formed from Han Solo, I have to go with Han, despite the fact he was lightened up and turned into a softy. I think Mal does the better job, and is far better written, but Han wins by default.

What do you think? Han or Mal?