Serious:
- Akira: Biker punks vs psychics in post-apocalyptic Neo-Tokyo. Fantastic cyberpunk art.
- Black Magic, Dominion, Appleseed, Ghost in the Shell, Orion: Shirow Masamune's meditations on AI control of unworthy Humanity.
- BLAME!: City grows out of control, a killer boy with a gravity gun blows up everything, searching for someone who can use a computer.
- Hotel Harbour View: One of the most beautiful and tragic things I've ever read.
Pulp:
- City Hunter: Obnoxious, sexist gunman romances & murders his way through bodyguard or assassin missions. Occasionally heartbreaking.
- Death Note: I know you think you know what I think I know, but really… tries so hard to be serious about the premise it almost wraps around to comedy. I like Ruk just eating apples, watching the Humans spread death and chaos.
- Dungeon Meshi ("Delicious in Dungeon"): The best work on dungeon ecology & cuisine ever published.
Goofy:
- Dan Machi ("Is it wrong to try to pick up girls in a dungeon?"): LOVE, but mostly practical ideas for how an eternal mega-dungeon can work, dungeon economy, guilds built around gods.
- Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya: Is it even insanity if reality obeys your whims?
- That Time I Was Reincarnated as a Slime: Overpowered fanservice fantasy, but the monsters are people, and thinks clearly about what they want.
- Urusei Yatsura: LOVE. Well, obsession and perversion, which is much the same thing. And space aliens as mythology.
- Yuru Camp∆: Just meditative camping in slightly civilized wilderness.
What:
This was a fedi post, but I want it in a more permanent place, and I've added a couple more. I'm open to suggestions, but I have zero interest in shonen fighting manga, nor most romance. Horror works OK, but I prefer that as anime or live movies. Aria and Girls Frontline are on my to-read list, I've seen a couple GF anime eps, but I dunno yet.