After the demise of S. Rangarajan, the last two films of Shankar (not including 'Nanban', which was a remake anyway) have had to rely on expanding the horizons of visual effects (and other such gimmicks) in Indian cinema. The costliest Indian film to date, 2.0, suffers from Rangarajan's absence big time. The dialogues don't strike a chord with the general audience the way they're supposed to - amid all the scientific mumbo jumbo (about photons, positive energy, and aura), there are scenes explaining everything in common-man language (including a sly reference to the 2G scam) - but even they are not humorous or clever enough.
2.0 essentially boasts a screenplay that Shankar carefully penned to inculcate one VFX-based set-piece after another, each getting grander in terms of scale. Rajini is restrained and quite boring as both Dr. Vaseegaran and the original Chitti, and he goes into full-Rajini mode only during towards the end. The blame is, again, directed to the writing department. There are no scenes that make us want to know Dr. Vaseegaran more as a person. In fact, he is as robotic as his personal aide, Nila (played by Amy Jackson). It was quite sad to see even a 'female robot' suffer from the male gaze (in one of the early scenes in the film).
We wait for the quintessential Shankar flashback to drive the film forward storywise, and to give the audiences a strong, well-written reason as to why one of the film's characters (this time, the antagonist Pakshi Rajan, played by Akshay Kumar) does what he does. Pakshi Rajan's backstory is a pretty good one (again not going into scientific depths; this is a sci-fi masala potboiler) and Akshay manages to make his Tamil debut a memorable one (and probably the only character worth caring for in the whole movie, even though he is the 'designated bad guy' who has to go against Rajini Kanth - not one or two, thousands of them!).
Shankar, by now, has realized that he can only go forward with films that require a large canvas, elaborate set-pieces, and quirky costumes and make-up. The VFX visionary in Shankar is seen in an extended scene where people (pertaining to various strata of life)'s cellphones start flying in the air for a while to eventually form the scavenger eagle that is Pakshi Rajan. And there are numerous such scenes! However, I did not enjoy a gimmick that the deranged version of Chitti tries to pull off on Pakshi Rajan during the climax sequence, which goes against the message (or rather, the morality) that the film tried to uphold in the first place.
Almost every shot requires visual effects in some form or the other; the effort has gone into making it all look great on screen is, without a doubt, astonishing. If only the same kind of effort was put into the writing too, we would have gotten a sci-fi masterpiece in our hands; but no, not happening!
