Based off of the manga by Usune Masatoshi (the manga was first printed back in 1997, and is still being produced), the anime was animated by Gonzo (directed by Takayuki Inagaki), and aired from October 4, 2004 to March 30, 2005. Taking place a 1000 years after a worldwide nuclear disaster, the show takes place in the Great Kanto Desert, and follows the life of Desert Punk (real name is Kanta Mizuno). Desert Punk is an odd character within the series’s cast: he’s a jerk (I prefer to call him a douche), greedy, selfish, and obsessed with sex & large breasts, yet at the same time is dependable, lucky, and daring. There is no job that he won’t do, as long as the pay is good, and there’s plenty of babes for him to stare at & fondle. As he wanders the desert looking for work, he makes few friends, and many enemies, as well as getting involved in the troubles of the common man during his quest for breasts & cash.
The first positive to this show is one that I’ve partially talked about before in some past reviews, and that’s the studio that made the show. As I stated above, Desert Punk was created by Gonzo, a studio that’s had a history of generally producing some great shows, such as Vandread & Full Metal Panic. The quality of their work is clearly evident in this show, as the animation is top notch (more on this in a little bit), but not in the “makes you cry cause it’s so gorgeous” style of animation. It’s more of like a “makes you smile cause it’s nice” style of animation.
Desert Punk’s second positive is the cast of characters. Unlike most of the other shows I reviewed, this show doesn’t really rely on secondary characters, apart from a few moments in certain episodes. Instead, this show relies exclusively on it’s primary characters, chief among them is Kanta. He’s a character that I both love & hate simultaneously, which is ironic, since the shows I have in my collection have a main character that I either love or hate. Anyways, Kanta is indeed one of the good guys, but he’s more of a selfish, anti-hero kind of good guy. You definitely want to root for him, but at the same time you want to punch him in the face for being such a massive douche.
However, he isn’t the only main character in the show. Soon after the first fight, Kanta comes across the sexy Junko, known commonly as the “Siren of the Sands”. She’s exactly the kind of girl that Kanta wants: she’s hot, has large breasts (it should be known that her chest is known for moving around a lot, and at moments, there’s a bouncing sound in the background whenever she walks), and in general is the kind of girl that Kanta is attracted to. Sadly, Kanta is also a bit of an idiot around women, as Junko uses her sex appeal to manipulate her male counterpart into bad jobs. A few episodes in, and we meet the sprightly Kosuna. After abandoning her previous master (after Kanta whopped his ass), she becomes Kanta’s master/confidant. In time, she becomes a good assistant, and even manages to become a good mercenary later in the show.
We round out the main characters with this next group, and they play important roles in their own right. We have the Machine Gun Brothers (a family trio equipped with heavy firepower), Rain Spider (a male mercenary that’s one of the few people that is equal to Kanta in terms of skill), and Natsuko Kawaguchi (the lone sister to the Machine Gun Brothers, and a capable hand-to-hand fighter). Though these characters don’t appear all the time, they still have some weight to throw around as the show progresses. Though Takayuki Inagaki gave all of these characters life on paper, it’s the usual work of Gonzo that brings them to life.
The third positive of Desert Punk is the animation. As I said earlier, this is a good looking show. Gonzo managed to translate the black & white manga into the colorful anime I watched. The bleak sandscape of the Great Kanto Desert seems relatively believable, as the land is dotted with rural villages, and the skyscraper ruins of civilization from a 1000 years before the story began. The people within this land look equally bleak, as their faces seem to have little hope on them, thus making the whole situation appear to be almost unchangeable, and infused with despair. Things changes later in the show, as the pristine, clean looks of the desert government forces add a tyrannical vibe, thus making the sandscape & the people that live in it even more bleak.
Desert Punk’s fourth positive is the voice acting. Most of the shows done by Gonzo, and released in this country, always seemed to have good English voice acting, and this show is no exception. Eric Vale is perfect for the jerky, yet strong Kanta, while Junko is voiced by Stephanie Young, a woman well known for voicing a wide variety of female characters. Jamie Marchi brings out the strength & coolness of Natsuko, and Luci Christian imbues Kosuna with the youth & innocence she requires. My only beef with the voice acting are with the Machine Gun Brothers. Is not that they don’t do a good job, since they do, but for some reason they all seem to sound the same. Makes perfect sense since they’re all related, but at the same time some difference between the voices would separate the three, and give them more individuality.
The fifth positive of this show is the show length. Coming in at the standard 24 episodes on 6 DVDs, Desert Punk is a nice sized show. I managed to watch this over the course of a week, and that’s what most otaku might do, although it possible to fit it into 3 or 4 days. It also helps in having each of the episodes play for 22 to 24 minutes.
The show’s final positives are it’s availability & pricing. I bought the 2010 complete collection, which can still be found in Best Buy & FYI, as well as Amazon. Although there’s only 14 new copies on the sight at this time, the starting price of $22.35, which makes up for the lack of copies. Ironically, there’s only 2 used copies, and for some god-awful reason, the first copy’s price $54.56. The show is worth money, but not over 50 dollars.
Desert Punk is one of the few shows that I have in my collection that’s next to perfect. It was animated by Gonzo, has a great cast of characters, voice acting is great, it’s relatively lengthy, and it’s still easy to find. However, there’s only one thing that really irked me about this show, and that’s the ending. I can’t reveal the circumstances of the ending, since I don’t want to spoil it for you. I will say only the following: I hated how they got to the ending, and hated the ending itself. It was (in my opinion) downright horrible, and didn’t suit the show at all.
Desert Punk gets a 9 out of 10. It was done by Gonzo, had a great cast of characters, the animation quality is also great, the voice acting is top notch, there a nice 24 episodes to follow along, and it’s easy to find & buy. I just wish it didn’t have that god-awful ending!
See you all this Thursday for Friday. Until then, stay Otaku!
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