Just watched, at a friend’s suggestion, the anime ‘Read or Die’. It starts with an electric samurai warrior demolishing the White House, who is then embarassed to learn that it wasn’t The Library of Congress. Then we meet our heroine, a bibliophile and itinerant teacher, who fights off an attack by a steam-powered, giant-cricket-riding clone of the 19th Century naturalist Jean-Henri Fabre.
Welcome to life in the Special Operations Branch of the Library of the British Museum.
The first half of the 90 minute show is full of great invention and silliness. Unfortunately, the ending doesn’t take advantage of the themes and ideas spun out during the first part. I was all set for a showdown in Bloomsbury and along the bookshops on Charing Cross Road.
You can buy the DVD at Amazon.
