"I'm Mary Poppins, Y'all"

Editor's Note: This entry contains minor spoilers for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2; read at your own caution.

About

"I'm Mary Poppins, Y'all" is a quote from the character Yondu uttered in the 2017 film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. The line has become popular among fans, inspiring art and memes.

Origin

"I'm Mary Poppins, y'all" is a line from the Marvel sci-fi action film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which premiered on April 10th, 2017.^[1] In the film, the character Yondu (Michael Rooker) uses his arrow to fly next to the character Peter Quill (Chris Pratt). As he's flying, Peter and Yondu have the following exchange:^[2]

Peter Quill: You look like Mary Poppins.
Yondu: Is he cool?
Peter Quill: Hell yeah, he's cool.
Yondu: I'm Mary Poppins, y'all!

Mary Poppins is the title character from the 1964 Disney film Mary Poppins. Played by Julie Andrews, Poppins is a magical nanny, who has the ability to fly by opening her umbrella and floating into the air.^[3] Yondu's body language in the scene, his hand held straight up into the sky, resembles Poppins'.

Spread

"I'm Mary Poppins, y'all" became popular in the weeks following the film's release. On May 6th, the day after the U.S. premiere, YouTuber Jeffrey Cruz posted a time lapsed video of a Yondu as Mary Poppins portrait being illustrated. The video (shown below) received more than 21,000 views in 10 weeks.

On May 7th, Instagram user _dpiddy^[8] posted an image (shown below) of Mary Poppins' body photoshopped onto Yondu, which received more than 3,200 likes. On May 13th, Redditor Isai76 shared it in /r/marvelstudios subreddit. Within four days, the post received more than 3,600 points (90% upvoted) and 70 comments.

Michael Rooker, the actor who portrayed Yondu, has been instrumental in propagating the meme.^[4] On May 9th, Rooker shared an image (shown below, left) of Yondu photoshopped into the Mary Poppins soundtrack cover on Instagram, garnering more than 46,000 likes. Six days later, he shared an image (shown below, right) from Instagram user @_dpiddy^[7] of a Yondu Fonko Pop figure in a Mary Poppins Fonko Pop box. The image received more than 32,000 likes.^[6]

On May 16th, Rooker posted^[10] (shown below, left) a picture of the actor with a woman in a Mary Poppins costume with the caption "She's Mary Poppins y'all… just kidding… #immarypoppinsyall #yondu #GotGVol2" on Instagram.^[9] The picture received more than 65,000 likes within 24 hours. That day, Redditor wdouglas37^[11] posted another angle of the shot (shown below, right) to the /r/Marvel subreddit and received more than 16,000 points (86% upvoted) and 500 comments.

Several news sites covered the picture, including Entertainment Weekly,^[12] Cinema Blend,^[13] Uproxx,^[14] and more. Twitter posted a Moments page commemorating the picture and the reaction to it.^[15]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References