Natasha Coutinho (MUMBAI MIRROR; October 30, 2017)

Rajinikanth’s next, the Shankar-directed sci-fi film 2.0, with Amy Jackson as the female lead and Akshay Kumar as antagonist, was scheduled for a January 26 release. Now, we hear it will arrive later in the year. According to a source, it has plenty of special effects and the decision was taken to do justice to them. Meanwhile, Akshay has lapped up the vacant slot for another one of his upcoming releases, Pad Man, which is inspired from the story of Arunachalam Muruganantham, who invented lowcost sanitary pad-making machine.

The R Balki film also features Sonam Kapoor and Radhika Apte. “2.0 will release in summer — it could be April. The exact date will be finalised in the next few days. The Pad Man shoot was wrapped up a while ago so Akshay decided to bring its release date ahead when he learnt of the vacant slot since the Republic weekend is a big draw,” a source informed Mirror.

This isn’t the first time 2.0 has had a change in its release date. Initially slated for Diwali, it was to clash with Rohit Shetty’s Golmaal Again but was postponed then too as special effects weren’t complete.