YMMV / Code Geass: Lelouch of the Re;surrection

• Angst? What Angst?: After returning from the dead, Lelouch is not visibly angry at C.C. for resurrecting him against his will and only later points out the fact that she did it out of selfishness. Initially, he is slightly confused because being resurrected was not part of his plan but Lelouch gets over it quickly when he learns that Nunnally is in danger. That part probably makes sense to him.
• Awesome Music: Revive by Unione.
• Character Rerailment: This film, and the preceding movie trilogy's continuity, makes efforts to revert Ohgi back to the Only Sane Man he was at the beginning of the series, rather than the idiotic hypocrite who made increasingly rash decisions and earned himself the hatred of virtually the entire fanbase. In the last compilation film, he begs for Lelouch to tell the truth before Schneizel's men and Rolo interfere, and he also punched Diethard for working behind the Black Knights' backs. He may also feel guilty for reluctantly making a deal with Schneizel, having stepped down from his position as Japan's Prime Minister at the start of Re;surrection (which takes place a year after the Zero Requiem), and even briefly attempts to commit suicide during his talk with Lelouch at Zilkhstan before the latter casually snaps him out of it.
• Continuity Lockout:
  • The movie doesn't follow the same continuity as the original anime. Rather, it follows the continuity of the three compilation movies released prior to the movie. As a result, certain details differ between the two continuities, and unless one has seen the movies or at least read about them, they'll more than likely be confused as to certain details here. Namely, why Shirley is alive and helping C.C. despite being killed by Rolo in the original anime, and why C.C. is determined to bring Lelouch back when the original ending had her content and ready to live her life.
  • As part of integrating the other entries into the main series, the compilation movies and this movie make more blatant reference to the spin-offs, mainly Oz the Reflection, namely by including Marrybell and Carine at Lelouch and Nunnally's departure, showing Marrybell amidst photos of the royal family, and showing the Glinda Knights under Oldrin's leadership attending Ohgi and Villetta's wedding. Unless you have knowledge about these characters prior, who they are and why they're suddenly included here when most of them weren't in the original anime will be lost on you.
• It's Short, So It Sucks!: One of the major complaints about the movie has been its two hour running time, which means there are only limited opportunities to spend on dealing with any of the unresolved tensions and conflicts between the characters. If the movie had been a season, it's possible to imagine these events could be slower and more detailed than their film depiction.
• Pandering to the Base: This film is essentially a variation of the long-held He's Just Hiding theory concerning Lelouch, which has now been canonized as part of an alternate continuity.
• Take That, Scrappy!:
  • After how much the fandom grew to loathe Ohgi due the blatant hypocrisy and Karma Houdini tendencies he developed toward the end of the original series, one of the first things the film has him do is almost commit suicide out of guilt for betraying Lelouch. Lelouch stops him. Before that, he also stepped down as Japan's prime minister after a year, deciding he wasn't as fit for the job. It helps that the preceding compilation movies have been giving him some Character Rerailment above anyway.
  • Similarly, Villetta is almost a non-entity in the film after she grew to be so despised for not only being a massive Karma Houdini who was either directly or indirectly responsible for basically everything that goes wrong in the original series but also compelling the Black Knights to betray Lelouch by using her relationship with Ohgi to convince him to testify against him. While she never gets on her knees and begs Lelouch for forgiveness like Ohgi does, she only has a few seconds of screentime in the opening where she's playing with her and Ohgi's baby before never being mentioned again.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Shirley has very little screentime in this movie despite playing an important role of resurrecting Lelouch by helping deliver his corpse to C.C. Even after Lelouch's resurrection, there was no interaction between them, aside from a picture in the end credits where Shirley receives a phone call, presumably from Lelouch. Many of her fans even question what's the point of keeping her alive, despite having one implicitly crucial role, due to her being left aside.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: It was always implied that Suzaku pretty much sussed out that Lelouch was lying about having deliberately turned his girlfriend into a mass murderer. But this was never true for Cornelia, who was a bitter enemy of Zero/Lelouch until the very end. When they're reunited and Cornelia brings up her wayward brother's killing of Euphy and Darlton (a nice aversion of Forgotten Fallen Friend for the latter), it seems like he might have some explaining to do, but nothing comes of it.
  • The decision to deal with a completely new threat (never established in the setting until this point), instead of the potential fallout of a worldwide conflict coming to an end felt like a missed opportunity to some viewers, especially those who considered the ending of R2 to be an Esoteric Happy Ending.
• Tough Act to Follow: The movie antagonists, Kingdom of Zilkhstan, are considered less memorable by some viewers, in contrast to the likes of Charles and Schneizel. While one of the Big Bad, Chanma, was able to outsmart Lelouch thanks to her Geass and is sort of a Foil in terms of how they want to shape the world, she doesn't have much screentime to make herself a very compelling antagonist. Predictably, this is something that was always going to be hard to avoid, due to the large amount of old characters involved and the limited running time available.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Ohgi's greater reluctance to betray Lelouch and the regret he feels for doing so is played up far more in the movies, and Resurrection continues to emphasize this, which certainly won him points with some of his former detractors. However, him attempting to commit suicide over it felt like a step too far for some, especially now that he has a wife and child to care for.