I happened to see a photo of his right side the other day and noticed that there is a little nick in the outer part of his ear cartilage, right about where the darkest red part is on this photo. And there’s that photo of the bullet going past his head where he grabs his ear and there’s blood on his fingers. I’m guessing that the bullet was close enough that maybe the air around it caused a wound? But there’s no way a bullet full-on hit his ear.

Regardless, I agree that it wasn’t staged. Just not as bad of a wound for him than they want us to believe (can’t say the same for the volunteer fireman, though…)