Starring: Alan Tudyk, Nathan Fillion, Adam Baldwin, Morena Baccarin, Gina Torres, Summer Glau, Jewel Staite
Deliberate mistake: After the Crazy Ivan, where they escape from the Reaver ship, the shot of Mal, Wash and Zoe celebrating on the bridge. Wash has his hands out in front of him like he's still holding the stick, but there's nothing in his hands. In the commentary, Joss Whedon mentions that, in order to get the shot right, they had to move the seat back far enough that Alan Tudyk couldn't reach the controls, so they instructed him to mime it.
Trivia: Nathan Fillion, Gina Torres, Adam Baldwin, and Alan Tudyk all later played villains on Joss Whedon's other Mutant Enemy productions: Fillion appeared as Caleb in the final five episodes of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," while Torres played Jasmine in season four of "Angel" and Baldwin played Marcus Hamilton in season five. Tudyk played Alpha in "Dollhouse".
Question: In some scenes, why do the Serenity crew members speak Chinese?
Chosen answer: One of the premises of the show is that the two major Earth societies that survived, and ultimately merged, were the Chinese and Americans. As a result the common language includes much Chinese. Clothing, signage, and building designs also have a heavy Chinese influence.