Mary Poppins Returns Review

I'll be blunt this movie kind of disappointed me. As a fan of the original Mary Poppins I felt this movie lost the joy and magic of Mary Poppins. The original Mary Poppins had such a positive message that this movie contradicted hugely. 

Whilst the songs were catchy, and the acting was good the story didn't have a strong plot and lacked any message or lesson that was key in the first movie, I spent the whole movie trying to figure out why Mary Poppins had returned.

The original Mary Poppins had a good message behind it about how there are more important things than money, while this Mary Poppins contradicts the original and tells you that money is important. 
I originally thought Mary Poppins had returned to show the Banks kids that they could and should be kids while they still could and the first song even lead me to believe that this was the reason she had returned however it didn’t seem it was as the story then veered away from that idea. I thought maybe she's going to show the original Banks children, Jane and Michael, that there is still more to life than money and Michael should follow his dream of artistry but that didn't happen either. Aside from saving their house (which Mary Poppins didn't really do, her umbrella did which confused me even more) the only other reason I could come up with as to why she had returned was to set Jack up with Jane. So if anyone can tell me why Mary Poppins came back in the first place I would really appreciate it as I'm still not really sure why she did. 

I also felt that Emily Blunt’s performance wasn’t quite there either. I enjoyed her performance sure, but it didn’t hold the same eloquence that Julie Andrews had, Emily Blunt was a lot rougher around the edges and I don’t think I would have minded as much if she didn’t sound like a scolding mother when telling people their actions were inappropriate or if she didn’t seem so stuck up and like she was constantly looking down her nose. While Mary Poppins is a very proper character, we did see her get down with the chimney sweeps in the original, so we know she’s not 100% put together, she can have some fun, whereas Emily Blunt's Mary Poppins seemed like she would hate Julie Andrews version of Mary. I understand trying to make the character different and not a carbon copy but when you are playing the same character then it needs to feel like the same character.

I did however love the children they cast. It can be hard to find good child actors and they managed to do just that, the three younger Banks kids were the best part of the movie to me and that was part of the reason I think I couldn’t understand why Mary Poppins had returned to take care of them.

I also really enjoyed Lin Manuel Miranda’s Jack, maybe even more than Dick Van Dyke’s Bert, the accent was more bearable for one thing, and he was a fun character but not even Lin could save this movie.

The music was also very catchy, and I loved Trip a Little Light Fantastic and Where the Lost Things Go, Can You Imagine was also up there but didn’t quite hit the right note for me. And while I enjoyed A Cover is Not the Book it didn’t feel very Mary Poppins to me, some people are calling it this movies Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, but I don’t think it was anywhere close to that. It felt weird and out of place. It was just a very random song for no reason, so while I enjoy listening to the song on its own, I didn’t enjoy it in the movie.

So while this movie was alright, it didn’t bring that magic and joy that the original Mary Poppins has, it had no overarching message about family or what you should value or any message at all really and there was nothing else in this movie to be the saving grace.

6/10