He is only 17, known as the Demon of the Desert and trying to deal with being sex starved at the same time. Desert Punk is a hilarious romp through a futuristic desert of bad guys and stupid villagers. Desert Punk is a legendary mercenary who always completes his job, at least in his own mind.

Highlights

Much of the first half of the series is all about Kanta (aka Desert Punk) taking on jobs and somehow completing them with a large amount of humor and sexual innuendo. There are plenty of characters introduced and developed, but the main character, Kanta, is never given much more of a personality than as a shallow, sex craved mercenary. Kanta does take on a young girl protégé, Kosuna, who had been the apprentice of a rival mercenary. After Kanta defeats him, she works her way into his good graces and becomes his apprentice.  This becomes the a key to the series.

Once the second half of the series begins to develop, there is a reversal of the entire series. Although the humor and sexual innuendo continues, there is serious plot line development. The government gets involved and there is the revelation and discovery of an underground ancient civilization. There is also the emergence of a secret underground mercenary army.

This group and their less than honorable leader are interested in the overthrow of the government and with the sudden arrival of robots from the past there is a real threat that emerges. The underground mercenaries recruit Kanta, but he is only in for the money. This leads to disastrous results. Kosuna is left to pick up the pieces and finds that Desert Punk had given her a better education than she originally thought. There are several twists to the plot in the last 4 episodes that help give the series meaning and places the existential attitudes of the anti-hero in perspective.

Overall

I had not heard anything about this series before and am very happy that the Viridian Collection has been produced. The first few episodes left me rolling on the ground with some of the slapstick and sexual humor. I was afraid that I was going to get bored with it after a while and it was getting rather tedious after the 4th or 5th episode. I would have to say that I am often thankful for the character development that typically comes in the middle part of many of shorter Anime series. I found the womanizing to become tiresome, but the humor kept me moving forward. 

Anyway, once the flavor of the series changes it becomes much more exciting and vital. All the characters are brought back together and their odd connections are revealed. Although this is a typical device for Anime series, it is very effective in this case. I found the odd connections to have a deeper meaning and even a strange kind of humanistic value to them. With the series taking place in the future and in a desert where everyone needs to rely on one another but instead follows the Darwinian ideal of the survival of the strongest. Desert Punk himself follows this ideal to the n-th degree. It is nice to come across a group of idealists that are mere puppets of other greedy so and sos. 

If you have not been treated to the Desert Punk experience and are a fan of this type of humor, you will find this to be a real delight. I did enjoy every bit of the jokes and slapstick along with the meaningful moral discussion that took place in the second half of the series. This is a delightful revisitation of a series that many may have passed by.

ComicsOnline gives Desert Punk, The Complete Series: Viridian Collection 4.5 out of 5 well endowed female mercenaries.