I knew this firefight sequence would involve a lot of tight close-up panels over the next few pages, so I wanted to take the moment right up front to establish the spatial relationships between the characters. It always irks me a bit when that sort of thing isn’t set up properly since it usually then just becomes a confusing mess of action without a sense of grounding.

The other thing I really wanted to get across is the overwhelming firepower of the cattle rustlers. I wasn’t entirely sure the huge guns were going to read from the last page of the previous issue and that they were much more advanced guns than the simple rancher rifles the rustlers had earlier. So to drive that point home, I needed the art to show that Roka and company are very much out-gunned here.