[malvosenior]

Honestly I wouldn’t recommend Patlabor to someone who only likes the GITS movie and Cowboy Bebop. It’s going to feel too slow and cheezy (in a way many anime fans including myself enjoy).

I’d probably suggest Rurouni Kenshin (Samurai X) or Gundam Zeta instead. They have interesting themes, are more adult and have amazing art.

[catalogia]

I think the aesthetic/pacing/art of particularly the first two Patlabor movies would probably be appreciated by somebody who's a fan of the first GITS movie specifically. There is a common cyberpunk thread running through both those Patlabor movies and GITS. Patlabor 1 has a plot that easily could have been a GITS plot and spends a lot of time dwelling on the ways apparent progress leaves many people feeling abandoned and worthless.

The Patlabor TV show is definitely much lighter material, a lot more accessible to children.

[Pigo]

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll definitely check them out. Maybe it's my age, but a lot of what I have seen like Deathnote or even the GITS SAC didn't click with me. Cowboy Bebop was just fun, and I forgot I was watching an anime.

I think maybe it's the high-concept, almost frightening, aspects of GITS that resonated with me. But I understand why it's not popular with most people.

[ihuman]

There's also the Patlabor OVA series that came before the show and movies, and takes place in the same universe as the movies. I feel it's tone is in between the movies and TV show.

Obligatory Patlabor 2 opening title sequence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsMTpSDAGxM

[LiquidSky]

>It’s going to feel too slow and cheezy

Patlabor is slow, sure, and purposefully so (it has and deserves the reputation as being the "boring" mecha show), but cheezy? I haven't seen the TV show which I hear is a lot more comic, but I wouldn't call the original OVA/first 2 movies cheezy.