Anyone attending Comic-Con has seen this hat, dozens of times on dozens of different heads.  This humble, hand-made, and homely piece of headgear may seem like an odd fashion choice to anyone not familiar with Joss Whedon’s Firefly.

You don’t know it yet, but Firefly is already your favorite TV show.  You just need to get busy and watch it.

Firefly is set in The Future, and revolves around the crew of a space ship named Serenity.  In one episode, a fierce mercenary named Jayne receives this hat in a package from his mother far away.  He declares the hat to be “cunning” and wears it throughout the rest of the episode.  And he looks ridiculous.

Yes, the fierce mercenary, a man, is named Jayne.   What can I say?  The Future is complicated.  Everyone dresses like a cowboy, and they all swear in Chinese, but it is SO GOOD.

Sadly, Fox Television didn’t think so, and the show was canceled before the first season had completely aired.  But the series sold incredibly well on DVD.  So well that Whedon was able to reassemble his posse and make the motion picture Serenity.

And that scrappy little hat, with a design and a color scheme that only a mother could love has become a banner, a badge of honor to the legion of Whedon fans.  The original Jayne Hat went home with Adam Baldwin, the actor who played Jayne.

This September the hat goes up on eBay. The California Browncoats, a philanthropic group of Firefly fans will assist Baldwin with the auction.  The proceeds of the sale will go to a charitable organization that provides scholarships to the children of fallen military personnel. 

It is a noble gesture for a mercenary to make.  I think his mother would be proud.