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Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Hofstadter's Godel, Escher, Bach. I also recommend Zizek's The Sublime Object of Ideology, but it's dense, so his film The Pervert's Guide to Ideology is a good stand in.

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Agree on everything except Zizek. He's an entertaining provocateur, but there's no way he's at the level of Hegel and Kant. His interviews in the British news media are hilarious though.

Hofstadter's book is brilliant, funny, delightful - a real treasure.

I'll throw a line to Zizek. In his serious works, he does set out a systematic ontology of reality. I don't fully understand it, if there is even something to fully understand, but along the way he without doubt makes you think, and gives relatively accessible interpretations of a ton of other thinkers.

He's not a major philosopher like Kant, but he is much more than a charlatan or provocateur.

To his credit, I probably wouldn't have picked up his serious work if his antics hadn't first put him on my radar many years ago.

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