Count Binface, a man in a trash can costume, was trying to explain why he would be a winner no matter what happened on Thursday in the most high-profile election he’s ever fought.

“Shall we do a little flowchart?” he asked me, gesturing with his gloved fingers.

If you haven’t been following British politics, you may be wondering why I was interviewing someone who claims to be an intergalactic space warrior from the planet Sigma IX. Count Binface is a character played by the writer and comedian Jon Harvey, 46, and he has run in several elections as part of Britain’s long tradition of novelty political candidates.

Now he is heading for his biggest gig yet. He is the main opposition to Nigel Farage, the leader of the right-wing populist party Reform U.K., in a special parliamentary election in Clacton, an area on England’s eastern coast.

Mr. Farage is expected to win by a landslide — he held the seat with a large majority until he resigned last month to force this vote. One recent poll suggested he could get 73 percent. But though he has sought to frame this as a “people versus the establishment” election, all of the other major political parties have refused to take part. They called it a political stunt to distract from a parliamentary investigation into a gift of five million pounds (about $6.7 million) that Mr. Farage had failed to disclose.

Count Binface, who would only be interviewed in character, is Mr. Farage’s most prominent rival in the election, although 32 other candidates are running. Some are longtime Clacton residents, such as Nick Pelas, who has lived in Clacton-on-Sea for over a decade, while three represent the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, a group once associated with Britain’s most famous novelty candidate.

If Mr. Farage “wins even with an increased majority,” Count Binface argued as he laid out his metaphorical flowchart, “but it is against 33 candidates including an alien shaped like a trash can, who’s won?”