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USDN Podcast is a cinematic indie comics interview series hosted by the USDN_Chairman and the Council of Nerds — spotlighting the creators, storytellers, and worldbuilders shaping the future of independent comics.
Each episode dives beyond headlines into the real journeys behind the books — from Kickstarter launches and creative struggles to the philosophies driving today’s indie storytelling movement.
This isn’t about rumors or recycled news.
It’s about the people creating the worlds.
Through in-depth conversations, creator spotlights, and crowdfunding discussions, USDN explores:
• The rise of indie comics
• The business of crowdfunding
• The art of worldbuilding
• The realities of independent storytelling
USDN is where indie comics come to life — for the fans, by the creators, and powered by the community.
You are listening to the USDN on the
DFPN.
Thanks for watching!
what is up everybody and welcome to the
united states department of nerds where we
are for the people by the people and
of the people some weapons are tools some
are symbols some are witnesses tonight we
sit down with a man who spent his
life studying the blade not just how it
cuts but what it represents you know him
as a judged
on Forged in Fire.
You know the phrase, it will kill.
But what happens when that philosophy,
that lifetime of discipline,
combat mastery,
and protection is forged into a story?
Tonight, Doug, Markadia?
Markadia.
Marcaida steps into a new arena,
not the Forge, not the Battlefield,
the comic book page.
This is Lineage.
The Council of Nerds is now in session.
Doug, welcome to the USDN.
Hello, everyone.
How y'all doing?
Thank you for having me here.
So close to getting it right.
And that was one of the questions I
meant to ask you before we went live
is how I pronounce your last name.
And I missed it.
But let's kick it off, Doug,
with who are you?
Well, my name is Doug Mercati.
Like I said,
you may know me as a judge on
Fortune Fire as one of the judges who's
the end user.
I am a U.S.
veteran.
I was served probably in the U.S.
Air Force.
I was born and raised in the Philippines
and I migrated to the U.S.
and that's why I joined the service so
that I could earn my right to be
in this beautiful country.
And while I was in service,
I got into the weapons arts.
I grew up in the Philippines.
Being over there,
I was into the martial arts,
but I never did any weapons art because
I had a fear of blades.
I had some issues with some gangs and
everything.
And I had a very bad experience where
I actually scared the bejesus out of me.
So empty hand fighting and all that's what
I did because I was a troubled kid.
So that's why I moved to the States.
But while I was in the Air Force,
I got back into the martial arts and
one of my friends over there was very
good with his, you know,
kickboxing and motions was just blowing me
away.
I'm like,
I got to learn what you're doing.
What are you doing?
And he goes, it's called Kali.
Oh, Kali, never heard of it.
I want to learn it.
It's Filipino.
Filipino, I'm Filipino.
What are you talking about?
Oh,
it's also known as our niece and a
scream in the Philippines.
I'm like,
Whoa,
those guys fight with weapons and blades.
He goes, where's your weapon and blades?
He goes, are you kidding me?
You don't know that?
No.
Well, I really wanted to learn it.
But when he told me it was a
scream in our knees,
I automatically pictured knives, right?
And he goes, no, no, no.
We trained with sticks.
You've seen them trained with a stick,
right?
I go, yeah.
No, no, no.
But you see,
this is also like a weapon.
You look at it and you see,
do you see the screwdriver in there?
Do you see a knife in there?
Do you see all these attributes?
The stick is just a representation of
that.
i didn't want to learn it but i
really wanted to learn his way of doing
the empty hands but he goes i'm gonna
guide you i'm your friend i'm not gonna
hurt you this is martial arts this is
us we're buddies what do you think i'm
gonna beat the crap out of you it's
not that kind of martial arts so slowly
we started with this and we started
progressing through other things that were
representations of this which
Easily,
it's the same way I hold a blade.
It's the same way I would hold a
stick.
Same way I would do a karambit.
It's the same way.
You start to see all these things in
there and just the attributes of that.
So in so doing,
I conquered my fear and I became addicted
to it.
to the art, my own ancestral art.
Then I started going to the Philippines
and I traveled everywhere.
And that's how my cycle of knife got
created.
I started learning everything that had to
do with it.
And after that, I continued on.
After I got out of service,
I started teaching it.
And in my travels,
I started to get requests to start doing
seminars.
A lot of my instructor or other students
were instructors already in the military
and law enforcement.
So it's a program for this.
We created the program.
And I started designing the blades based
on,
because I was a military contractor on the
side to teach the weapon combat.
So I started to design the blades with
KBAR and FOSS and all these other
companies.
And one day,
Fortune Fire called looking for an end
user.
They found my videos on YouTube.
And shall we say the rest is history.
I got to do what I love.
I had to leave my medical field job
after twenty one years to be a military
contractor.
But then the show came over and I
said, you know,
I'd rather just do the show than that.
And it was a blessing in disguise.
That's really my passion.
So you've lived in a world of weapons,
martial arts,
and you've trained for decades.
What made comic books the medium to choose
to tell your story of lineage?
It's because,
so the comic book is nothing more than
a way for me to tell my story.
When I was already training my arts,
I met with my grandmasters and my teachers
and my fellow trainers.
We all had stories to tell.
I go to the Philippines,
and even though as good as they are
with the weapons,
there was always mysticism involved in the
blade.
There was a lot of spirituality involved
in the arts.
My teachers all had amulets.
Amulet for what?
To protect me from bullets or evil
spirits?
I go, what?
I go, this one here?
You're afraid?
Yeah, they had that.
And I've seen things where I don't
question it because I'm the Westerner.
But all these stories, fireside stories,
everything we do in our training,
it really resonated with me to be able
to make stories out of it for my
own.
now fast forward i'm on fortune fire and
i'm studying the all iconic weapons from
history and i'm looking at different
cultures they have the same thing
excalibur you know the lady of the lake
or or a sort of mars or sort
of purses every blade all over the world
they have all these stories as well so
i wanted to create my own based on
even watching the bladesmiths when they
say i want to turn this ore into
something what will i let the metal tell
me what it wants to be i mean
that's the metal tells you i'm like huh
So there's something we said when they say
they put their heart and soul into a
blade.
Well, I knew in other countries,
in other cultures,
they have souls and spirits living in
blades.
In some cultures,
they have to make a male blade and
a female blade.
So they're all connected, right?
Because it's all over the world.
So with that,
when I was talking to my producer in
Fortune Fire,
we actually came up with this concept to
make a TV show.
And that's what we were going to do.
I was connected to Fortune Fire.
Let's have this story about this,
about every blade having a story to tell.
It's from the blade's point of view.
That was very unique.
It would have been unique, yeah.
Yes.
So COVID hit and the film industry was
going through changes,
cables dying and having its changes.
So what happened was my producer left our
Fortune Fire and he got out of the
business.
I'm like, OK, I'm stuck with this.
But then I never gave up on my
dream to get this story told.
So I met with some friends and some
investors.
They guided me to get heroes.
These guys, because I go, well,
what's the first comic book going to be?
Well, I go, you know,
one thing I learned,
because I'm a motivational speaker.
I do a lot of speaking engagements.
I go, one thing I've learned,
if you speak from experience, you're set.
They can't tell you you're right or wrong.
So I said, for the first book,
my first series, Brotherhood of the Blade,
I'm going to talk about my experience in
the Philippines, my life,
all the things that have to do from
my stories of my blade.
So I came up with lineage because I'm
going back to my own lineage.
But there's more to the word lineage
because of all the things that we're
doing.
And before you know it,
there to be something a little bit more
there.
oh a lot more let's talk about it
first right i'm talking about my lineage i
go back to the philippines the story of
lineage is about these two brothers who
grew up in the philippines they have a
memory a memory of training uh the blades
one has a temper the other one is
just very gifted but then you start to
see that
Out of the blue,
the father stops the fight,
and he's killed by a demon.
Fast forward, the older brother wakes up.
He's now in the U.S.
They migrated.
Hmm, similar.
And as they migrate to the U.S.,
he has nightmares of the dream,
and he doesn't want to remember anything
about the Philippines,
except that he inherited a blade that he
gets to have from his father.
Now,
this blade is nothing more than just a
trinket fidget tool.
He used it to spread butter and everything
else, but never a weapon,
because he just wanted to be reminded of
what it is about.
Yeah.
younger brother on the other hand goes i
don't remember much about when we were
young i need to find out about why
do you have that blade what's my father's
blade doing with you how come i don't
have it so they become estranged now
they're older men uh older young men right
now so he starts using his tick tock
to create his own paranormal research show
it's called on the verge because he's
verge but when he starts looking around
it's really because he wants to find out
more about this blade
little by little he's getting into the
spirit world into the paranormal for clues
about the blade well the older brother
catches one of the shows and sure enough
because he was following a clue in a
tip he saw on a wall a logo
that was connected to his past and that
freaked out the older brother so he rushes
to his brother they confront each other
what the hell are you doing leave the
past alone he was like yeah it's easy
for you to do you have the blade
i want to find out about it and
before you know it the demon
that killed his father manifests itself in
the apartment that they're in so the
younger brother freaks out he's just
trying to fight the thing back get out
of my house okay who invited you here
he's a smart aleck the older brother is
just shocked it's a demon of my dreams
what's it doing here but then as soon
as the demon makes a move against his
a younger brother memories come back and
instinctively the blade comes alive he
pulls it and uh stabs the demon now
the demon starts to bleed and the brother
goes wait if it bleeds it can be
killed
then he realizes is this really a demon
then he looks at the blade and all
the memories of their training come
together and he asks his younger brother
you remember what our father taught us
these moves and everything like you know
the dance goes yeah yeah i do it
was they were taught how to fight as
a team and slowly and surely enough they
start working together and they kill the
demon now the demons got this horrible
skull and thorns and you know in a
big horn so they're inside it's just a
mask
So when they remove it,
all of a sudden, everything is answered.
It's not a demon.
It's a human being.
The younger brother goes, well,
now that it's been revealed, guess what?
We need to go back to the Philippines
and find out what this is all about.
The story unveils.
But here's the thing.
It's the blade that's telling the story.
That's really cool.
It's not the brothers.
You see, if I may, right,
with the art here,
because this was really cool because the
artist is just a genius to me, right?
You can see that?
So that's the first page, right?
And I call it still life,
like still life, because that's what,
you know,
when you look at when you're painting
fruits and everything,
it's called still life, right?
But when you look at that,
the blades right there,
the blade is already grayish, right?
It's on the skull that was being used
by the cult, right?
You have two older men there.
You have ashes and you have a candle
that's flickering there.
Now,
when you go to the storybook and you
see anything in red and black,
that's the blade talking.
If I may just,
this is art to me, right?
So the beginning says,
if only you could see through the edge
of my existence.
In the hands of a child,
I danced through terror,
yet felt the weight of shadows where
hearts stood still.
Poetic.
In the quiet moments,
I longed to be heard sharp as a
blade.
In the hands of the brave,
truth in the shadows dwell,
comes a tale where every blade has a
story to tell.
That's the way the blade is trying to
tell.
But you see what the beauty of this
in the still life?
You see the candle, the meaning of that?
The blade is turning gray and the blade
is basically saying, before I die,
before the last candle flames are put to
rest,
let me tell you my story before I
die.
It's beautiful.
And then it goes,
and as you see the blade here is
slowly fading away.
It tells you in the beginning,
when I first realized who I was,
I was actually being used by these
brothers who were training with their
father.
That's a start.
And when I said it,
it's like a movie.
You know, when the movies,
you see somebody dying, like, yeah,
that's me.
Let me tell you what happened here.
No, that is really cool.
So how much...
You've already answered this, Ashley,
but a lot of this is kind of
inspired by your story,
your personal story.
There's pieces of it in this story.
What was it like for you to kind
of put a little bit of you,
your real life into this story and kind
of like a secondhand autobiography almost?
It was easy because I already do this
every day.
In Facebook,
I have something called Morning Coffee
with Mark Haida.
It was a thing I started doing when
I was away filming Fortune Fire as to
let my boys know this is what dad
does every day.
Well,
it turns out that they're not part of
Facebook.
So it became a community.
but my job there is to talk about
positive things where i've been what i do
what interests me and i always speak it
from my point of view so i'm not
posing as anything if it's from my history
from my stories and everything else
there's no right or wrong it's what i'm
talking about so when i got into the
comic book thing i just simply talk about
the things that i already know the things
that i already see from different ways and
my creative way of telling a story because
i'm a storyteller
So it wasn't difficult at all.
What was difficult was trying to make it
into a comic book.
That's why Kid Heroes really helped.
We had a Patricio Guimelso of Kid Heroes
brought in these writers,
Earl Bailon and Justin Kizon,
who
we had the skeleton of the the outline
of the story and they modernized it they
make it all flow because i still had
certain pockets here that were like holes
to be filled like oh how you know
how how easy is that that it happens
to be there that's so you know it's
gotta form together they have to be able
to be able to tell it and it
makes sense you see i'm not an action
guy i'm a story guy
i love action but if it doesn't have
a story i get disinterested and i don't
care about the actor i need to have
a good story that's the most important
thing so those guys were able to do
it but we found you know uh um
artists who are who blew me away all
right so i announced this in san diego
comic-con last year at the panel because i
did the cameo with the other comic book
they were in
but i got to announce it and we
had our comic book and there was this
artist beside me because i'm new to comic
books i never was into comic books because
i couldn't afford it in the philippines my
friends had comic books so i would look
at that but i didn't understand that there
are issues and you go further away but
this art was always great but i couldn't
tell the difference
San Diego Comic-Con,
everybody's art is amazing.
So I'm talking to this guy,
and this fellow Filipino was talking about
his history,
like he was born and raised in the
Philippines, he was an artist,
and he went to the Philippines to discover
who he was to come back to the
U.S.
I was born and raised in the Philippines,
I was different, I came to the U.S.
instead, and I found my identity.
Nonetheless, he was saying, yeah,
we were talking about the art,
I was looking, oh, nice art.
And he's like, yeah,
you have a good artist too.
I'm like, cool, thank you.
I don't know the difference, so tell me,
you have a good artist.
That guy telling me that I had a
good artist in my comic book is Will
Sportacio.
He may know a thing or two.
Yeah.
I didn't know who he was until every
time I mentioned it and I mentioned his
name, I was like, are you kidding me?
I was sitting beside a legend and I
didn't even know it.
It's amazing, right?
How...
big that world is and how but also
how small it is at the same time
yeah so i obviously i'm like now that
i dug into it and everybody i'm like
reading about it i'm like damn well i
gotta work with him i'm gonna ask him
for the rest for the rest of the
books and i've got i've got planned i
gotta work with this guy because we were
together and and just that he gave
validation it's not just saying yeah it's
good from someone like that so i was
blown away then i get to see the
artwork
Like I said, the genius,
the Easter eggs in this comic book that
he does.
Let me just put it very simple, right?
If you look at this guy right here,
I don't know if you can see it.
There's a bandaid in his hand.
That's the older brother.
Now,
when they're training and they're
fighting,
you'll notice that the younger brother is
able to evade a lot of cuts.
He doesn't have to work for him.
The other one is full of temper and
a lot of strength.
He's working harder, not smarter.
The Band-Aid, it wasn't later.
It goes, yeah,
that just goes to show that the older
brother is not as skilled as the younger
brother.
What?
Are you kidding me?
But that little small detail,
because we always knew that the older
brother had a temper.
So the small details are all over the
comic book.
When I talk to him,
he is a man of the land.
He does venturing.
He goes adventurous.
He always does a lot of hiking.
He talks to the tribes and everything
else.
When he does that,
he's really into the culture of the
Filipinos.
I was born and raised there.
I didn't even know a lot of this.
Even our blade that's telling the story.
If you look at it from this point
of view, at first I thought,
what are those crocodile scales?
It looked cool because all I cared was
about the mark.
He goes, no, no, no, no.
Look at it that way.
You see the little dots there?
Those are the heads.
It's a stick man holding hands.
That means family.
It's a real tattoo in our culture.
I go, what?
He goes, yeah,
and he showed me his tattoo because the
lady who put it there is famous.
She still does it the old way.
It's lineage.
in the blade i'm like are you kidding
me this guy understands it but what made
it even better was he's not a martial
art practitioner in the filipino arts so
when we got to talking about it go
i don't want to see superman punch i
don't want to see hulk smash i want
to see filipino martial art moves so what
we did to do that was we actually
I trained with my brother,
and I started recording my training
sessions with my brother and the
techniques to finish in the blades that we
were doing.
He watched it over and over,
and he was able to capture those motions.
If you are a practitioner, you see,
for example,
there's a technique here we call the
scissoring, right?
We scissor this way.
But in a comic book, it's stopped.
But if you put the tracings and the
motion, they go, I recognize that.
So he was able to convey that because
we recorded the videos.
That's how I was able to get my
martial art into this because there's a
lot of my history here.
No, that is really cool.
And I had a question prepared here just
to ask you, you know,
what was that transition like going?
I mean, you're a natural storyteller,
but jumping into a comic book that had
to feel like something very unknown to
you.
And you've answered that.
But it's really cool to see you not
only...
jump into this unknown but and fully
embrace it and to fully immerse yourself
into it san diego comic-con is like the
biggest comic-con in comic-cons which is
really cool that you got to go there
you got to sit on a panel and
answer questions and just just be there to
immerse yourself in all that energy that
san diego brings with it
And all that energy also inspired and
continued my story.
You see, this is just issue one.
Issue two.
So the brothers find out, okay,
there's something here.
Issue two, they go back to their country.
This is about brotherhood of the blade.
One of the things about martial art
training,
especially in the way I learned it,
we train for six hours.
Who trains for six hours?
We're not in a school.
We're in the backyard.
We train in the dark.
We train in a full moon.
We train with campfires in there.
We train with drumming.
We're really into this.
That's a cult.
That is cultic behavior.
We are manipulated in our heads to be
warriors because that's the way our
warriors were taught, to be invincible,
to have all these incantations and
rituals.
That's a cult.
So I knew that because I had to
pull myself out of that, right?
Now, I'm at Comic-Con.
i see people there doing cosplay i see
what they're wearing these people are at
eighty degrees and wearing full leather
but i got to talk to them and
they are just as immersed in their passion
and see the passion is passion no matter
what it is exactly that is now going
to influence because our artists put a
mask on the bad guy i go our
cult is going to be also answering the
cult of cosplay
Because cosplay has that.
What is it about a mask?
Why am I hiding behind the mask?
What does a mask do?
Am I invincible when I put a mask
on?
I may be a regular person without the
mask, but I put it on,
I become something else.
So all that is found in my story.
So when I immersed myself into the comic
book world,
the comic verse or whatever it is,
I also allowed it to speak to me
and help me make my comic book important.
You see, in my story,
the blade has a soul.
If you look at the first still,
that's when the blade is about to die.
But here's the thing.
When the blade dies,
its soul will transfer to another blade in
another era, in another time,
and tell a different story.
That's why it's also called lineage.
It continues on.
I love multi-layered stories like that.
and just how it can apply to just
about anything but the fact that it's been
applied to a blade in this instance it's
just so cool like the multi-level
storytellings because there's so many
metaphors right comic books can do yes in
in many ways that that's very freeing also
um but just as there's meaning to the
blade having a soul in it
And the blades that are making it.
I wanted my comic book to have a
soul in it as well.
How do I do that?
Issue two.
Because Kiss bled into the ink that they
printed their comic book on.
Yes.
Supposedly.
Well, they also look at the comic art.
It's got to be meaningful.
So in issue one,
you get to meet the Mercado that's selling
the blade.
Issue two,
you will get to meet my Kali Hawk
Tomahawk, real.
You will get to meet,
and you saw him already,
my well i call this the battle ball
these guys are making cameos in my story
they're part of it hey man uh what
are you an issue two i'm an issue
one oh no we know you're we're both
in issue two yeah how do you like
it well i like being interviewed yeah i
talk to my blades right but here's the
thing as a knife designer i design all
my blades now i'm putting this into my
comic books
why because it's meaningful to me to watch
my comic book and say hey hey there
you are thank you man it's meaningful to
me that these guys are part and vice
versa the comic book world now comes into
me goes like wait wait the real versions
of this that you can get that are
in the comic book yes so doesn't that
make it a little bit more
meaningful to you to know that you can
actually have the blade that was created
from the story.
And the same thing is I have a
story that's connected to the blade.
That's why it's meaningful.
That's, again,
another way that I'm putting my soul into
this.
Because now the comic book isn't just a
comic book.
If you had one of these and you
picked it up and you know there's a
story to it, it's a wonderment.
I've given you that connection.
That's what I want.
It's not just a comic book.
There are real things here that you can
have tangible in your hands.
and that was the idea that is really
cool and like i said i will always
love comic books for that multi-level
storytelling that they are able to do so
and i love the fact that you the
way you're you're telling this story right
now just answers a lot of my questions
but we're at the point now where so
the blood cult who is pursuing this blade
as a supernatural edge to your story i
will always love a good supernatural edge
in a comic book story or interested in
a story in general but how kind of
how did that that develop into your story
Because of my exposure to that world in
my knife culture,
there are blood cults in there.
There are cults in the Philippines.
There are myths, shall we say,
that deal with that.
You are able to absorb your enemy's
energy.
By killing them.
And there's a way and there are rituals
to that.
The blade, and this is all,
there's a lot of cultures that say that
the blade has to be fed.
When you unsheath your blade,
you made a mistake.
You better sheath it with blood or it'll
be thirsty or it will cut you because
you're not being careful.
It's got to be fed.
These are the myths and laws that we're
talking about, right?
There's a famous saying also in Latin
America, do not unsheath me without honor.
No, do not unsheathe me without purpose.
Do not sheathe me without honor.
Meaning,
don't just pull me out with no purpose,
but do not put me back without honor
either.
So there are so many meanings.
Like I said, you had touched on this.
The blade is not bad.
it's the person using it that's bad yeah
in the story here the brother had to
face his fears in over in order to
conquer it i faced mine you see when
i look back in my lineage in my
past i realized i was afraid of blades
but it wasn't the blade that was bad
it was the people using the blade who
accosted me that was bad i was a
kid what the hell do i know right
so when i look at this it's the
same idea this is not evil this is
stuff that we can build on
it's used for destruction yeah but i can
also open a box with this i don't
want to use my teeth i can cut
food with it we use it all the
time i can cut stuff to build with
it i can cut to open up and
cure a wound so that of which destroys
can also build so that's the whole thing
about this right it's not the blade so
don't blame and say the blade is bad
because the blade will go look
You created me.
Like if a blade ever went back to
its bladesmith, right?
Hey, dad, how you doing?
How you been?
Well, you know what?
You made me as a weapon to cut
and everything else.
Well,
you gave me away to someone and that
person,
they used me to clean their toenails.
The disgusting thing that would happen.
I'm like, I don't know.
It's not my fault.
If only they can come back and tell
us.
Oh, man, that's definitely a dirty one.
So at the end of the day,
how would you describe lineage?
Is it ultimately an action story or is
it a story about healing, reconciliation?
How would you describe lineage as a grand
total?
If you can only sum it up one
word, one way.
It's our lineage.
It's our story.
Because I will tell you that one way
I teach is the way.
So one thing, what am I?
A martial artist.
I know how to tell stories.
I have the ability to see one thing
and tell me that I see more beyond
normal perception.
I see a screwdriver here.
I see a whip.
I see everything because I will make it
as such.
knowing that when i tell my stories in
the beginning i tell a story about a
blade telling a story about its lineage
then i talk about the brothers who are
facing their fears then i talk about here
what happens when you actually see
something and you realize it's not what it
is you start to realize that the demons
that we create are not the real demons
in front of us they're the demons we
create in our heads in our past so
many times when people read this ago
You can see the art,
but look at the metaphor.
Look at the other lessons that you can
get.
It is a reflection that you're able to
go back into your past and see it
from different points of view that give
you different lessons.
So lineage is ours.
It's by being able to go back to
heal yourself.
But it's also in the beginning a whodunit.
It's a thriller.
It's a martial art action-packed.
And it also delves into a lot of
the human psyche about cultish behavior.
Mm-hmm.
So you brought real authenticity to your
own comic, not just the blades,
but with the martial arts.
You've literally recorded yourself and
your brother doing the martial arts in the
backyard,
and your comic artists recreated that in
the book, which, honestly,
real choreographed fighting.
brought into the comic book world is the
coolest thing ever because we're not just
getting hulk smashes we're not getting
laser beam eyes we're getting no kidding
doug and his brother in the backyard
practicing and just recording themselves
doing the action of this book and then
it's being translated into this book which
is honestly one of the coolest things i've
ever heard
no thank you to be brought into a
comic book i mean they do it they
mocap in video games and stuff like that
but this is a comic book we're talking
about and for it you want it to
be as authentic as possible to me it's
like hearing jackie chan did his own uh
stunts right you did your own stunts for
a comic book which same thing in my
opinion i don't care what they say
How did you because you have to balance
not just the martial arts,
but the realism within the comic book as
well.
How did you how did they not just
yourself, the writer,
the the comic book artist?
How did you find balance within all that?
Well,
a lot of times we spent many nights
talking about the views that we have and
also the authenticity of it all.
We talked about the one thing is we
all are Filipinos in this group because
that's the first thing, right?
I went back to this group.
And some of them were born and were
born and raised here in the US.
I have some of the Philippines,
but we have that bridge and we talk
about our experiences from our culture.
That's why it's easy to remember.
I go, hey, remember like in Tumuros,
have you been to the Philippines?
Yeah, I've been to that old church.
So that's the kind of feeling I want
from that old church.
Remember in the jungles and everything,
we have banana leaves.
Oh yeah, we have.
So we can all relate to that feeling
the minute we see it.
And that's why it's easier to tell a
story because we're truly from that
culture.
Dude,
that is so cool that you got a
full-up Filipino writing team, art team.
Dude, that's just so cool.
not seen that before and it's just really
cool to see not just the representation of
the filipino culture in a comic book like
that to me i think this is the
first time it's amazing i was born and
raised in the philippines and i've been in
the u.s more of my life than i've
ever won in the philippines i was there
for eighteen years i've been here for like
fifty how old am i now but
um even in the in the artwork that
we have when the brothers go back home
the artist has put so much of my
memories when i was back home i'm laughing
my heart out like oh my god i
remember that and i had to send them
pictures also my training grounds i sent
them pictures of my teachers i sent the
pictures when i was younger and he put
me in there on my youth training with
my teachers and like perfect
Dude, that is so cool.
So let me ask this.
What do readers misunderstand most about
edged weapons and martial art that this
comic actually kind of says, hey,
it's actually like this?
Because people just assume knives,
you know, it's, you know,
like the Steven Seagal shit, you know,
you see on his movies.
Well, one thing,
being in the medical field,
and I worked emergency room all the time
in trauma,
you don't survive weapon assaults that
easily.
There is a consequence to getting cut.
You may be out for six months,
you cut muscles and ligaments, you bleed.
You don't survive that easily.
So that's one of the things, right?
We're nothing.
We're airway, breathing, and circulation.
You puncture one of those things,
you're out.
So in the movies,
when you see somebody heal that quick,
they're like, no, we're not John Wick.
We're not going to heal that easily.
It's dangerous.
Dangerous weapons are dangerous.
They're created for one purpose.
When you get cut, you will feel it.
You will go into shock.
It does a lot to the body.
Now, having said that,
The weapon is not what's dangerous.
It's a person wielding it.
You see, in the Filipino martial arts,
when you first learn people, okay,
this is a single edge.
This is double edge.
We have two weapons.
We have single weapon.
We have a long weapon, short weapon.
So it's all about the weapon system.
But in reality, it's not.
They're tools.
You see, in the end,
when you're at the higher levels,
I am the weapon.
everything else is a tool i will pick
up something and i will look at its
attribute and i will make it work i
can make a toothpick a very dangerous
thing if i know what i'm doing you
know why because when i say this weapon
your focus is on this well what about
my punch what about my elbow what about
my head button my kick and then i
add this so this is not the weapon
it's just one of the things i'm using
how many weapons have you had you had
one i saw it in his hand like
That's a very,
very limited way of looking at things.
He had a sharp object in his hand,
but he can punch, kick you,
bite you and everything else.
But your focus is on the sharp edge.
Now you're in trouble.
If you look at the person as a
whole, he's the weapon.
All of a sudden, well,
where are his tools?
Everywhere around you is a tool, a chair,
everything, your phone,
everything is a tool that you can use.
But it's the person that wields it that
makes it a weapon, not the tool.
Yeah, I like it.
I like it a lot.
So we've already answered my whole net set
of questions, which as we went along,
which is I love that kind of stuff.
But I do have to ask this one,
though.
This one hasn't been answered yet.
Do you see lineage becoming something
larger beyond the initial story that you
have created right now?
I've seen it in my mind's eye.
I'm manifesting it,
and I know it will be.
This story is not new.
This has been going on for fifteen years
in my martial art travels,
with my martial art group,
with my close friends.
We've told this story over and over around
us,
so we perfected it to say everyone I've
talked to says it's a great story.
Now, I was in Athenscon.
In Greece, I don't speak Greek.
I'm there and people were coming up
because they knew me from Fortune Fire and
they go, oh, nice artwork.
Artwork?
No, there's a story to this.
As soon as I talked and told them
about the story with my interpreters,
their eyes all widened up.
I knew that already.
Look, I'll ask you this.
you know the story is being told by
a blade.
What do you think of that?
You know that the blade will later on
move to another blade in another time.
Who knows maybe tomorrow it'll wait when
it dies it'll wake up as a katana
and then they'll be in Japan they'll have
a different story to tell and then when
that passes on it goes on to another
blade.
Maybe it's a kukri somewhere in Nepal and
they have a different story to tell.
Now it is just a witness
Is it going to be part of it?
Because people think just because you're a
blade, you have to see combat.
Do you know how many blades are out
there that just collect dust and are
nothing more than just witnesses?
So that's why the stories are endless.
It's all about the great stories.
What can this tell me?
It could be just a witness to a
love triangle.
They've never been used at all.
But then you can see it also used
in rituals.
Those are the very easy ones, right?
Oh, it's made for rituals.
It's made for combat.
That's the easy part.
He's brought up a really cool
What I would really enjoy seeing is, like,
as the knife dies in this story and
wakes up in its next life,
is the next, you know, maybe the next,
you know, couple of comic books.
Like, it's just, like,
this story that could just keep going and
going and going.
It is.
It's made for that.
That's exactly the plan.
It's the same knife from the beginning
telling a different story from a different
point of view in a different lifetime.
It's not the same knife.
It's the same soul.
Yes, the same soul.
And that to me is just a really
cool concept to run with.
And I've already had like at least four
books already planned out.
This is just book one,
Brotherhood of the Blade.
Nothing more than when it was living in
this particular blade in the Philippines.
But we have one already for elsewhere.
It could go forwards,
it could go backwards in time.
Dude, that is a beautiful thing, Doug,
and by damn, I'm here for it.
I'm glad.
I'm looking forward to it.
When you actually read the comic book,
let's get back together and do a comic
reading so I can tell you all the
different Easter eggs that you can find in
all the pages that our artist has left
behind for us to find.
You know what?
That is a good segue.
And I'm a huge fan of Easter eggs
and comic books.
I will literally study comic books.
Oh,
you can read a comic book in ten
minutes.
I cannot read a comic book in ten
minutes because I'm looking for Easter
eggs.
There may not be any in that entire
book.
But I'm still hunting for Easter eggs
because there's got to be something there
in my head.
And it prevents me from just like, oh,
I'm just going to read this story.
No, I'm looking at the artwork.
I'm looking at the individual person.
I'm looking at the character's eyes to see
where they're looking in the story.
What are they looking at?
So that's just me.
I am very attentive to the details of
the page of the story.
But I'm glad you brought that up because
let's talk about this Kickstarter.
It's currently ongoing.
It started earlier this month.
Did you do a full thirty day or
how long is your Kickstarter?
I think we're doing a thirty day on
this one.
We're going to finish the series.
So the first one that we did is
just to see if I should even be
involved in the comic world.
And it got a very good review.
It got good reviews.
So I'm like, well, let's finish it.
But here's why I like going back to
my comic book and going back to the
words.
And let me explain this because this is
something important here, right?
You say you can go back to the
comic book and look for Easter eggs.
The reality there is there are no Easter
eggs.
You just keep going back with a new
set of eyes.
you're older yesterday i was i i go
back to my this and i was looking
at it and then today i'm doing something
and something i learned something else i
come back and educated with more
experiences and so every time you go back
to it you know if i go back
to it as a child as an adult
a teenager as an adult i will see
different things all the time plus
if i showed you this today that's what
you're getting right right there tomorrow
i will ask you to do this you'll
see a different version now i'll ask you
to look at it from this point of
view that's all you're going to see or
from this point of view so it's always
with new eyes right but the fact that
you are going back and taking the time
to do that to find your lineage once
again i'm telling you that word is so
important let's go to kickstarter let's do
it i want you to be part of
this
I wrote lineage also for my great, great,
great grandkids that I will never meet
because I'm going to be dead.
This is their lineage.
This is where they'll go and go,
you know, my great,
great grandfather wrote this?
Really?
That's cool.
Okay.
Number two, I want you.
be part of my lineage everyone who was
part of lineage of lineage in the first
issue will forever be engraved on the
comic series what does that mean that
means that you two will be able to
pass this on to your great great great
great grandkids so when they pick it up
you go you know george smith right there
that's my great great great grandfather
you have something to that number three
you're going to get replicas of the
stories that are in here,
of the characters that are in here.
What am I going to do with this
when I die?
Well,
I might as well pass it on to
me.
So my great-great-great-great-grandfather
was like,
so this is where he was and everything.
And look at this ancient little thing that
was passed on to me.
You see,
when we look at the great comic series
or great stories of old,
Star Wars with George Lucas,
imagine if George Lucas was there and
saying, hey guys,
I know this is going to be a
hit.
Would you like to be in my comic
series?
Imagine what that's worth today.
Not only that, Game of Thrones.
If I was like in the beginning,
I was like, you know, guess what?
I was there for Game of Thrones when
it first,
and then my name is in that comic
book today.
They didn't do that.
I'm doing it for you.
I'm telling you,
be part of this so that you have
something to pass on because we're not
going to live forever.
Be part of this because you have
something, an heirloom to pass on.
And I'm giving you the chance to be
part of my journey.
It's not my lineage anymore.
It's our lineage.
Who does that?
I'm in the last quarter of my life
where my job right now,
my purpose is to leave everything that
made me shine.
I'm teaching seminars.
My seminars will be teaching this because
I got to leave it behind.
What am I going to do with it?
All my knowledge,
everything that allowed me to shine so
that other people will pick it up and
shine.
This story, book one, who knows?
If I'm lucky, I'll get to book five.
When I'm gone,
I hope somebody picks up the mantle who's
part of all of this and will write
six, seven, eight, nine,
ten till it keeps on going.
It's not for me to just give up
on it.
That's what lineage is all about.
It's our lineage, not mine.
I'm just a piece of the puzzle that
started it.
I love that way of thinking.
So what did this first Kickstarter that
you did for book number one,
what did that validation mean to you to
have that one be as successful as it
was?
It was that I got to share my
story with people and I got to really
talk to them and say,
did you see what I saw?
That was the most important thing to me.
When they read it, I was begging them,
can you tell me what you read?
What did you read?
Because I want to know if I got
my point across.
And everybody had different versions of
it.
That's why I realized everybody will
always put their own spin on it.
But then wouldn't it be great if we
all got together and talked about it?
This is what my story is.
Because that's what I train in Filipino
martial arts.
You see,
I will give you bits and pieces of
the puzzle.
I'm not going to spoon feed you where
I teach you everything.
Then you have to see only what I
see.
I'll say, okay,
I'm going to give you a couple of
pieces.
What do you see?
I see a giraffe.
Good.
I really was going to teach you a
dog.
It's a picture of a dog.
But you saw a giraffe.
You saw a cat and everything else.
It's yours.
That's yours forever.
It's something that I don't create.
Same thing with my storyline.
I want to see what you read.
And maybe somehow, some way,
we're going to build on that.
for the upcoming series dude i like it
and honestly this has been coming into
this i didn't know i kind of understood
what the comic book was about i mean
i got the bio got all that stuff
i have not actually as soon as we're
done here i'm hopping on kickstarter and
i'm getting my own lineage and uh so
i can read it and um
but we'll come back and we'll review it.
We'll see what you saw,
but we will do it.
Oh, I'm, I'm down.
You know, Jeff,
Jeff's the guy who set it all up.
Let's get back and do this.
Like I said,
I am just excited that I get to
share my story,
but I want to see what's in your
mind's eye.
And, and once again,
After having met me,
after having read this,
and this is why it's so important for
people to go to podcasts where they're
featuring comic books,
is that you get to really see what
it's about.
People don't read.
They say they are read.
I glance through it.
I go, no,
you don't really see it that way.
So let's talk about it.
And that's what I'm starting to learn.
You know, I'm enjoying because you said,
you know, manifesting, right?
do i know that this is a hit
yes i do i know it's this is
fifteen years so i know but i wanna
take you and make you part of it
when it becomes now this is just the
call of action this is just so be
part of my kickstarter look i don't ever
ask anything from my followers for nothing
it is something for something
You pay and you help support it.
You're going to get a comic book.
You're going to get all these add-ons,
all these different versions of a comic
book.
You get the stuff.
You'll get more.
I'll sign it for you and everything else.
I don't ask for something for nothing.
You will be getting more than that.
Then it becomes yours that you can pass
on.
That's forever.
Yeah, I'm going to complain about, oh,
I donated to that.
No, you did not.
You got something that you're going to
keep passing on.
There's value.
There is value.
I'm telling you right now,
just like if I start in the beginning
with George Lucas and the Star Wars and
what those things are worth today,
I'm telling you right now,
this is what it's worth today.
I've been there.
I don't talk without confidence because I
know I've already tested it.
So that's what I'm doing.
I want to give back.
I want you to be part of my
last purpose of my life.
I love it, man.
I love your enthusiasm.
I love your energy.
I love everything you're bringing to the
table in the representation of the
Filipino heritage and its culture and its
people.
Like I said,
I've not seen it in comic book form
before.
And to see you bring it to the
forefront for everybody to see now is just
simply a beautiful thing to behold.
And I can't thank you enough for doing
it.
I've been there.
I've done that.
I've been all over Asia.
We were talking beforehand.
We're both prior service and just getting
to see it at the forefront of something
like this in its natural raw form that
you brought it to.
absolutely amazing to see doug please join
us you know not only that i came
up with another add-on that was so
exciting about so you have the blade the
race functionally great right but that's a
canvas right there so one of the things
we're going to add on is i'm going
to have laser print of the comics uh
art in it
That's another, right?
So I just keep on coming up with
something.
Let's make it more exciting.
What else?
You're going to get a pendant of the
blade.
That's even cool, yeah.
Right?
Because why?
Because I'm proud of it.
Number one, it's cool.
Oh, yeah.
And it's just a representation of the
characters.
You have it red when it's active,
and when it's dormant, it's black.
Oh, that's really dope.
And to be fair,
I would probably own my NetSun box,
and I'll probably be sitting here with
that, trying to open boxes like this.
Oh, no, this is just a pendant.
It's not sharp.
I would still try.
But wait, there's more.
I do have a sharp version of it,
a box cutter.
Oh, see?
That's what I need right there.
That's what I need.
Come on there.
Come on, guys.
Be part of the movement.
That right there is going to be a
part of What's in the Box episode three
when it will air next month.
You bet.
You bet that's what it is.
It's going to be there, guys.
Be part of the journey.
I'm telling you, you won't regret it.
What other comic books or comic series
does this and involves everybody to have
fun?
Dude, this is...
I've been a part of so many Kickstarters.
Like,
I'm probably forty fifty starters to some
degree, whether it's been supporting them.
I think I'm a super backer on Kickstarter
at this point or I'm very close to
it.
So that's almost twenty five starters
there.
But that doesn't include the ones that I
couldn't support at the time because your
bro had just paid his mortgage and he
couldn't back it at that moment.
But yeah.
But, yeah,
this one is a lot of fun.
And I always say, you know,
for people doing Kickstarter,
it's just to keep it simple.
Unless you have the means to make it
something bigger and you have a team
around you to help you make it something
bigger,
then by all means go bigger and go
home and you've gone big and you're at
home, I'm guessing.
So it's really cool to see something big
like this and you're not just, you know,
like, yep, you can get comic books,
but
knives you know that's really cool to me
because i'm a big fan of knives i
i lose them all the time i yeah
i don't know what it is i probably
have the worst habit of anybody about
losing that kind of stuff but um except
for my boot knife my boot knife i
know where it is twenty four seven seven
days a week it's right on my boot
i know where that one is
But when people hear your name years from
now, Doug, we're talking years.
I'm no longer doing this,
and you're no longer doing what you do.
What legacy do you want attached to your
name at the end of the day?
Is it forged in fire?
Is it legacy?
Is it your time in the military?
Is it being a respiratory therapist?
Or is it all of the above because
that is what made you Doug?
A lot of times when I think about
what is the lesson I want to leave
behind is that I was kind and I
was happy.
That's what I want to leave behind,
that I was considered a kind person.
I have far many issues in my life
that I've ever done.
I've done a lot of bad things and
everything else.
Now that I've been able to be pulled
away from that, I want people to remember.
I want them to,
when they think about me,
I want them to smile.
They've seen a lot of things that I've
done in my TikTok, my Instagram,
my Facebook,
and I am the goofiest person in the
world with my videos.
I do the funniest things because I want
them to smile for a lot of things.
So I hope that that resonates with who
I was.
That's a judge.
You know,
I want one day that they'll say,
you see that old man in the wheelchair
there in the corner playing with the poop?
It will kill me, guy.
It will kill, yeah.
LAUGHTER
No, that's not.
Yeah, it is.
Talk about that, man.
But are you ready to bring it home,
Doug?
Let's do some rapid fire questions.
All right.
I already know the answer to this one,
but I'm going to ask it anyway.
Blade or firearm?
Blade.
Yeah.
I'm a firearm guy, but hey.
I don't need bullets.
I can take it everywhere because a blade
is everywhere.
I don't like projectiles.
You don't have to have a license to
have it.
Discipline.
Instinct.
Discipline.
I have a lot of instincts that are
bad.
I'd rather be disciplined.
Realism.
Spectacle.
Realism.
function before aesthetics and I've seen
some of the interior pages in this comic
book is When Doug says him and his
brother recorded Danes the pages I've seen
Definitely reflect that and it's really
cool.
I think everybody's gonna love this book
one word that will define lineage Family
You know what else is family
A lineage.
So lineage could have been an answer.
Yeah.
All right, Doug,
tell everybody where they can find you and
where they can find the Kickstarter.
What's listed under?
So you can find me on my social
media pages.
I've got a Facebook under Doug Marcaida,
Instagram under Doug Marcaida,
TikTok under Doug Marcaida,
YouTube under Doug Marcaida,
and all my shenanigans are there.
For this,
just go to kidheroes.es slash lineage,
I believe.
But if you just go to Kid Hero,
you'll find us listed there for our
Kickstarter.
We have about...
I don't know, twenty five more days,
I think, or twenty.
I don't know how many days we got
left, but be part of it.
And for the first fifty backers,
you will get a very special.
What do they call it?
It's like it's a cover with a red
flash on it.
Right.
OK.
Yeah.
For the first fifty fifty backers.
So I think we're at thirty thirty five.
So hurry up, guys.
Sign up and you'll get that very special
thing.
when we're done here it'll be thirty six
or thirty seven hopefully more hopefully
you know hopefully more this will
definitely go live before the kickstarter
ends like i said it'll be live within
a couple of days so hopefully it brings
some more in because it's definitely what
people should definitely check out it's a
fun story supporting a fun cause i love
seeing vets do good
Amen.
You're a good dude.
I know people know you for Forced in
Fire.
I like to see you as you're that
kid who came to the States and
made the right choices in life,
joined the military,
earned your right to be here,
which is honestly,
I've seen so many people do that
throughout my twenty plus years of doing
it.
And it always fills me with pride that
they are serving their country,
that they their adopted country to become
a part of that country.
And it's it's amazing to see.
Doug,
I'm glad you did that and I'm glad
to have you here tonight.
But everybody go back lineage.
The link will be down into this.
Actually,
the link is currently in the description
of this video.
But once it goes live again on both
podcast platform and on YouTube,
all those links will be in there.
His his TikTok, his Instagram,
his Facebook,
the Kickstarter link will all be there for
you to check out.
Highly encourage you support a fellow
veteran and go.
Go give this a like.
Pick up a copy of Lineage because it's
a fun book.
I've seen covers of it.
I've seen some of the artwork from it.
Really beautifully done book.
So check it out.
But some stories are written.
Summer lived, lineage is forged.
Doug has spent a lifetime studying
weapons,
but this story isn't about destruction.
It's about protection, it's about legacy,
and it's about the blade that connects the
past to the present.
If you want grounded action,
real martial arts philosophy,
and a story cut from lived experiences,
Lineage Kickstarter launches February,
which is just eleven days ago, I believe,
if my math is mathin'.
But, Doug, thank you for coming in today,
talking to the fellow Council of Nerds
members, and to everyone watching,
this has been the United States Department
of Nerds,
where indie comments come to life.
Ladies and gentlemen,
the Council is adjourned.
Y'all be safe out there.
Thank you.
Duh.