It seems to be a belief among more than a few pilots that an RA requires an extremely aggressive action to avoid a collision. It does not.
Not necessarily. Fly what's commanded, and it may be an agressive maneuver. What's required really depends on the conflict.
I've always understood that you have 5 seconds to respond to an RA and 2.5 seconds to the reversal of that manoeuvre.
In a perfect world, that might be true. In the real world, it's not necessarily true.