The Abominable Dr. Phibes
Heavily derived from Abominable Dr. Phibes where the lead character, disfigured by a set of villains, takes revenge revenge on them by killing them under innovative and extreme conditions. There's even a murder using insects (similar to the bees scene here).
Shankar's lost the plot. Some unnecessary characters and sequences and music, although visualised well, was very average. Anniyan seems to be Shankar's last decent film (if we can ignore Nanban which was a scene by scene remake) and he is one of the most over-rated filmmakers in India. His films are so predictable, they have some/all of these elements - social service, revenge, usage of flashbacks, innovative ways of dressing up and killing, melodrama and sympathy through the middle of the film, over the top fight sequences etc.,
It's almost like a template already is in place for all his films that he just fills them up with character names and basic theme for each film. Innocent robot becomes ruthless robot. Ambi (innocent) becomes Anniyan (ruthless). Vasi loses everything (girl and his robot). Sivaji loses everything (girl and his money/property). Anniyan kills people one by one. Lee kills people one by one. Not to forget a melodramatic flashback.
His screenplays have also been manipulative and 'I' certainly looks like it was written by a beginner. It was like one of those scripts that I had attempted during my graduation days to pass time.
Vikram and Amy were brilliant, but I can't even refer to them as the saving grace, because the script was that bad. Of course, the casual audience, having not been exposed to genuine great films from around the world could get boggled by the superficial elements like song visuals, art work and technical elements like cinematography and performances. Ultimately, the development of plot was ridiculously bad and can be found out by film buffs though.
People call out for ridiculous fight scenes in most tamil films when they see one. However, I have no clue why Shankar gets a free pass here as well. Not even a single film of his over recent years have had believable fight sequences. If you're being an escapist and watching films for entertainment, at least be consistent in it - trying to sound like a critic for a film and then giving free passes to others in the name of entertainment is moronic.