Is this Forgotten?

I think most of it comes down to most talked about animes being what is currently showing rather than what already showed years ago. Paranoia Agent is a great classic of its time, I remember watching it late at night on Adult Swim and renting the dvds later. it is an experience worth seeing.

I found it through ChatGPT lol

Most Satoshi Kon fans generally agree his feature films are more coherent in style than Paranoia Agent. From what I've seen over the years, fans tend to always put this last when ranking Kon's works. I personally really enjoyed it, but I'd have to agree, it's a lot less intense than his other works. It just seems too disorganized compared to sth like Perfect Blue or Paprika, even when considering Kon's psychedelic style.
Maybe it's also too slow? Films are a lot easier to push through even when they're slow burners, but not many seem to have the attention span to sit through a dozen episodes of such anime.

I adore Paranoia Agent, but I feel the reason it's not talked about as much is a combination of Kon fans being more akin to filmbuffs than anime otaku, and most anime fans only caring about modern, more moe-like shows. Shame, cause Paranoia Agent is really one of the all-time greats.

Mid as f. The first 5-6 episodes were so good but so good that what they did after that was insane, I completed this anime without any desire to.

As someone who just finished it (and really enjoyed it!) I don't believe so. I think that it's just not one of the widely marketed series, so you either have to know someone who likes it and recommends it, have it come up in your algorithm based on other things you watch, or have to come across one of those articles or video reviews that discuss great anime to watch (ex. 10 of the best anime from a certain era, or 10 anime with a certain style or theme etc.).

It's like a hidden gem.

No, it's not. I keep this show in my phone. And whenever I feel like it, I watch it. It will not be forgotten. Ever! Satoshi Kon lives in my heart, even though i don't know him

just told it a bunch of shows I liked and asked it what I would like.

I feel kinda guilty about doing that though, that's another part of my agency that I voluntarily gave over to AI.

I probably won't do it again

Where would you publish it? I'm intrigued

It’s an amazing show, however 2019-2025 has been a non-stop release of studio original anime shows. Steaming services (besides Crunchyroll) doesn’t have it, probably for rights and other reasons like viewership. Classics get buried all of the time with some like (Texhnolyze, etc) getting completely shelved from streaming. Searching for a great show is like treasure hunting through a fantasy slog.

100%, I'd also add to that that there are things that are left up to interpretation too! Where the viewer's own experience and perspective can influence their understanding of what's taking place. Which means if you were to watch it at 16 years old, then again at 26 years old, and then again at 36 years old - your understanding may change each time! Even if you had seen it already so you understood the deal about "Shonen Bat" himself.. your take on the narratives leading up to the reveal would be different. This is one of the reasons I think it's way of exploring its ideas through various characters in its "world" is so good.

Artistic styling and tone too, it's tone and art style are perfect for the story. The way it uses light, darkness, colors and the like.. and it's character design and facial experessions? Plus the soundtrack??.. It's a great example of some of the things I really like about anime. On that note - while those series I recommended to you are good ones, I saw Psycho-Pass on your plan to watch list. Before you watch the others I mentioned, watch it - it also is a social commentary with a great tone. It's not as much a "mystery" as Paranoia Agent, but you may really like it. (Season 1 in particular is what I'm recommending - I loved Season 1 and it was so good I've been hesitant to watch the sequels since Season 1 is a complete story and I'm not sure where they'll take it given the ending and all)