Inspired by real-life news reports of a major SAT cheating scandal, the film transplants the heist structure to a school-exams setting, and features themes of class inequality as well as teenage social issues.

Although at first reluctant, Lynn agrees when she finds out that the school, despite her scholarship, collected extra fees from her father, who earns a modest income as a teacher.

Lynn returns to cheating when Pat and Grace ask her to help them with the STIC—an international standardised test for university admissions—a scheme which will earn them millions of baht.

Lynn and Bank will fly to Australia in order to get a head start on the exams—which are held globally on the same day—and send back answers for Pat and Grace to distribute to their clients.

Returning home, Lynn finds that their scheme was a great success, but, broken by the experience, turns her back on her co-conspirators and rejects her share of the money.

Nattawut had previously directed the company's 2012 psychological thriller Countdown, and the producers believed his abilities would lend themselves to developing Bad Genius as a heist film.

Nattawut was immediately intrigued, and agreed to direct the project, which was developed under the working title "2B Come Won" (a reference to the 2B pencils used to fill in test choices).

[5] Nattawut wrote the script together with Tanida Hantaweewatana and Vasudhorn Piyaromna, researching the format details of current standardised tests, as well as actual methods of exam cheating from the news.

[7] The story was developed as a Hollywood-style heist/caper thriller, but the writers made efforts to ground it in a context that would still be relatable to a Thai audience.

Primarily a singer and songwriter, Thaneth had been absent from acting for over thirty years when Nattawut came across a magazine interview of him, and invited him to cast for the role.

[11] Nattawut noted that Thaneth's performance led him to modify the script and make the father less controlling, resulting in a more profound father-daughter relationship.

[13] Special preparations by the actors include Chutimon practising writing with her left hand, as her character is left-handed, and Chanon memorising the value of pi to beyond the 30th digit.

[9] A particularly challenging scene to film was a chase sequence shot at the underground section of Redfern railway station, which had to be fitted into the trains' normal running schedule.

[19] Stylistically, Nattawut says he was inspired partly by 1970s thrillers such as The Conversation, The Parallax View and All the President's Men, leading him to mix in a certain retro/vintage style in Bad Genius.

[22] The score was composed by Hualampong Riddim's Vichaya Vatanasapt, who employed gradually intensifying cyclical elements to help build suspense.

[23] The film was officially announced by GDH at a press event on 20 April 2017, along with the release of its theme song "Mong Chan Tee" (มองฉันที,[d] which translates as "Look at Me").

[52] However, the Bangkok Post's film editor Kong Rithdee noted that Bad Genius appeared to be an isolated case, as wider government support of the creative industry was still lacking.

[80][81][82] Bad Genius was well received by critics in Thailand, who praised its concept and design, which tackled a familiar, mundane subject and turned it into an exciting caper thriller—a first for Thai cinema.

"[83] According to Nation TV's Natthapong Okapanom, "Bad Genius is a work of craft that will help raise Thai cinema to another level of diversity.

"[84] Manager's Aphinan Bunrueangphanao commended the acting, especially Chutimon's, Thaneth's and Chanon's, predicting multiple wins for the upcoming awards season,[85] while A Day  [th] magazine's Phanuphan Veeravaphusit noted of the production: "Due credit must be given to ... the photography, with its unfamiliar-yet-meaningful angles, and shots taken to second-by-second detail, which, combined with the fast-paced editing, add to the suspense, stirring the viewers' emotions throughout the entire story.

"[86] Phanuphan, as well as reviewers for Sanook and Post Today, also took note of the film's subtle critique of Thai society's inequality issues and problems with its education system,[87][88] although he found the character's motivations for their actions in the end to be inadequately explained.

[86] Similarly, the Bangkok Post's Kong found fault with the somewhat moralizing ending, but also noted that by then the film had already successfully entertained the audience.

[89] Reviewing the film for The Hollywood Reporter, Clarence Tsui wrote, "Bad Genius scores high marks as a ceaselessly entertaining thriller that cedes little ground to the cheap comedy and sentimentality of recent Thai hits.

"[90] And according to Variety's Maggie Lee, "Bad Genius deserves full marks for a whip-smart script that makes answering multiple-choice questions as nail-biting and entertaining as Ocean's Eleven.

While Sarah Ward wrote in Screen that "the feature never shouts its message, nor lets it get in the way of its lively heist-like action,"[92] the South China Morning Post's Ben Sin commented, "It's an odd narrative departure [... which] gives the impression that Thailand's film censorship system is as strict with moral guidelines as is its mainland Chinese counterpart.