Is 'iSmart Shankar' heavily inspired from 'iBoy', a British teen sci-fi thriller originally streamed by Netflix in 2017? That's the question sections of media are asking.

On the face of it, some similarities are striking. In the Trailer for the Telugu film, a chip is inserted into Ram Pothineni's brain, following which he seems to think in two minds. In 'iBoy', something close to this happens: A teenager wakes from a coma, only to find that "fragments from his smartphone have been embedded into his brain".

If Ram belongs to a gang (seemingly) in 'iSmart', the teen hero in 'iBoy' belongs to, again, a gang.

If Ram hears phone transmissions (those sounds in the trailer indicate this) in his brain in 'iSmart', much the same thing is witnessed in 'iBoy'.

On his part, writer-director Puri Jagannadh has said that his film has nothing to do with the British series.

The "mass sci-fi" releases on July 18.