review-loop stalls on large diffs (100+ files)

[benthomasson]

Problem

code-review review-loop stalls indefinitely when the diff between --base and -b contains many files. In our case, MR !340 on agents-python had 108 changed Python files and 377 auto-gathered function bodies. The tool completed the function-gathering phase but never progressed to the actual review — it appeared to hang after printing the function list.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Have a feature branch that diverges significantly from main (e.g., includes merge commits from main that add many files to the diff)
2. Run code-review review-loop -b feature-branch --base main --beliefs beliefs.md --repo /path/to/repo
3. Observe: function gathering completes (prints 377 functions), auto-discovers test files, then hangs

Expected Behavior

Either:

• Chunk the review into smaller pieces and process sequentially
• Warn and abort if the diff exceeds a reasonable threshold (e.g., 50 files)
• Allow --max-files or --paths filter to scope the review

Actual Behavior

Process hangs after function gathering with no output, no error, and no timeout. Had to review manually.

Environment

• code-review installed via uv tool
• Target repo had 108 changed files / ~41k insertions (most from merge noise)
• The actual feature was only 9 files / 750 lines