Produced by Kalaipuli S. Thanu of V Creations, the film stars Vijay, Kajal Aggarwal and Vidyut Jammwal with Sathyan, Jayaram, Manobala and Zakir Hussain in supporting roles.

The project, which marked the beginning of a collaboration between Vijay and Murugadoss, was reported in July 2011, and the film's title was formally announced on the same year in December.

The film's soundtrack was composed by Harris Jayaraj with cinematography handled primarily by Santosh Sivan and editing by A. Sreekar Prasad.

Jagadish confronts Kameeruddin and forces him to commit suicide, and later returns to Kashmir along with his fellow army men after reconciling with Nisha.

In July 2011, it was reported that Vijay and AR Murugadoss would collaborate to make an action film, after completing their then-respective ongoing projects, Velayudham/Nanban and 7aum Arivu.

[18] Instead of his regular editor Anthony and art director Rajeevan, Murugadoss chose A. Sreekar Prasad and Thota Tharani for those positions, respectively.

[19] Though Kingfisher Calendar model Angela Jonsson took part in a brief photoshoot with Vijay by Sivan in Chennai,[20] Kajal Aggarwal was eventually confirmed as the female lead.

[21][22] Priya Anand was initially signed on as the lead actress, but could not commit due to scheduling conflicts with English Vinglish (2013).

[30] Dubai-based Malayali orthodontist Prasanth Nair was also signed to play a small but important role of a commando, making it his acting debut in Tamil cinema.

[17][32] At Linking Road in Bandra, Vijay acted and operated the camera himself for one scene with Sivan's assistance, which had to be filmed quickly with the unaware public.

[17][35] Although Sivan has mostly preferred to shoot on film, he stated that he shot Thuppakki digitally because "the story and milieu of [Murugadoss's] script demanded it".

[37][38] In Mumbai, while Vijay was filming a sequence which involved him jumping from a height, he slipped and injured his knee; he was not wearing a knee-pad at the time.

[50] The makers opted for a traditional Friday release,[51] since the date appears four days ahead of Diwali, which falls on 13 November, a Tuesday.

[53][54] Thuppakki released along with Silambarasan's Podaa Podi and Shah Rukh Khan's Jab Tak Hai Jaan.

[56] Post release, Islamic fringe groups protested against the film and its makers, claiming that it portrayed Muslims as terrorists and traitors.

[57] Some of the activists gathered near Vijay's residence at Neelankarai on 14 November 2012, a day after its release, and raised slogans against him and the film in Arabic and Urdu.

[58] Later, Murugadoss, S. Thanu and S. A. Chandrasekhar later apologised openly to representatives of 23 different Muslim outfits, and agreed to delete the scenes to which objections were raised.

[73] It was further delayed after a lawsuit was filed against the makers, by filmmaker Ravi Devan, who claimed that the title bore a similarity to his film Kalla Thuppakki.

Deccan Chronicle rated it 3.5 out of 5 and cited: "Thuppaki has come out as an action thriller that depends on mind games and smart plans rather than bloody fights.

[92] IBN Live named it a "well written Tamil film that engages the audience" and added that it had "the energy of Vijay and intellect of AR Murugadoss".

[94] Sangeetha Devi Dundoo of The Hindu commented: "One of the first promos of the film, with snapshots of Mumbai, lurking terror, the antagonist threatening Vijay to which he responds 'I am waiting' went viral on social networks.

Jayaram and Sathyan, who're supposed to make us laugh, fail miserably in the process" and concluded, "In essence, "Thuppakki" has the energy of Vijay and intellect of A.R.

[98] In contrast, Vivek Ramz from in.com rated it 3 out of 5 and said that it "doesn't meet the huge expectations it had created for itself", calling it "another regular commercial film which entertains in bits and pieces".

[100] S. Viswanath of Deccan Herald wrote, "While Vijay gives it all to live up to his fans' expectations, Kajal Aggarwal is just a pretty prop to pep up the proceedings.

Despite boasting of ace cinematographer Santosh Sivan and Harris Jeyaraj as the music composer, this Thuppakki is not the Deepavali dhamaka it had promised with its promos".

[101] In 2021, Nithisha Nanda Kumar of The Michigan Daily stated that "While it may have portrayed the story of an Indian officer well to some extent, Jagadish and Nisha's relationship felt extremely forced into the plot".

[103] However, the film won four of ten nominations at the 2nd South Indian International Movie Awards: Best Actress – Critics for Aggarwal, Best Actor in a Negative Role for Jammwal, Best Music Director for Harris Jayaraj and Best Fight Choreographer for Kecha.

[120] The dialogue "I am waiting", spoken by Jagadish (Vijay) just before the interval, gained popularity and has since been used in the pre-interval scenes of other South Indian films as well.