R.O.D: Read or Die OVA

Watched this as a part of an anime club watch. It was actually suggested by me because this has been sitting in my PTW for years. I've seen it in so many recommendation lists, so many people with similar taste to mine seemed to like this OVA. And yet... I didn't really like it...

Anytime I watch something in this vein of "short OVA with goofy female lead with some amounts of 90s/early 2000s fanservice", like Gunsmith Cats, I always think I'll like it more than I actually do, but this one was probably the most disappointing so far.

Let me cover the good stuff first though. The setting is totally wack in a fun and stupid way. In some alternate steampunkish reality the British Library is a mega military force (?) that also guards and acquires books of all kinds by any means necessary. Special agents within the.. army? have weird super powers (how they obtained them isn't.. really explained) and they fight against.. the Chinese? that clone.. historical figures?? and steal books I guess. America is also somehow involved. However, due to the title and general book related-ness of it all, I wasn't expecting the anime to be just pure action. Despite the wacky premise (haha look at this you guys! anime has the kookiest plots!) this is actually a pretty standard spy/action story with not a lot going for it. The main character is that typical clumsy/silly female lead but she seems to work as a school teacher on the side? And she's really really into books! Even her surname is Readman! But we don't get much else about her. I really wish the OVA had like.. half an episode worth of casual character development thrown in to replace some of the action. Everything being a super cliche wouldn't even be that bad if we got to see more of the characters being people or whatever.

Anyway yea, sadly too short, but I've read 3 chapter mangas that made me cry and love the characters, hell, it's the length of an average movie (around 1.30h in total) back when movies didn't last a whole eternity... It's possible to give a lot more within that time frame! Idk, just not very enjoyable overall. I can't even say much about it...