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The opening gunfight: speed vs. accuracy
posted by Zürich GnomeSTAFFMOD on February 16, 2017 at 1:04 AM
If you watch and listen carefully to the gunfight at the opening of each episode, you'll notice something interesting about the trade-off between speed and accuracy. Dillon starts to draw first, but his opponent actually gets off the first shot. The opponent's shot misses Dillon, but Dillon's shot hits its mark. So Dillon was slower to shoot, but more accurate.
Reply by PT 100
on March 15, 2017 at 6:10 PM
To quote the guy that Robert Mitchum gave the package to deliver in Out of the Past (after telling the guy, "You know, a bad memory is like an ill wind. It can blow somebody luck."): "I always say everybody's right."
I think we're all right depending on which opening we're talking about.
Reply by Moondoggie
on June 10, 2017 at 10:57 PM
SPOILERS: In the episode "Matt Gets It" the speed vs. accuracy issue is taken to the extreme. Marshal Dillon faces a gunman who is far faster, and Dillon is wounded in the close-quarters gunfight. He notices that the other gunman, who has already killed two people in Dodge, always makes sure to be very close to his opponent when in a gunfight. Dillon realizes that, although the gunfighter is very fast, he is not accurate except at very close distances where it's hard to miss. So he lures him into a situation where the other guy can't get close enough to Dillon. The other guy shoots first by a large margin, but Dillon takes his time and kills him with one shot.