In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, we learn a lot more about the historic relationship between Michael Rooker’s character Yondu, the blue-skinned Ravager who kidnapped Peter Quill from Earth as a child, and the captive who becomes his charge.
If you haven’t seen Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and don’t want to read SPOILERS look away now.
In the film, Yondu sacrifices himself to save Peter aka Star-Lord – a noble gesture in a movie that sees Peter’s father figure bare his soul to his surrogate son.
We sat down with Michael Rooker who plays Yondu in the Guardians films. He talked to us about Yondu’s death and why Yondu reveals his true feelings to Peter at the same time as telling him the truth about his real father, Ego, and the big planet dude’s nefarious plans.
“We really get to the bare bones of it in that last scene,” he says, referring to Yondu’s death sequence. “The whole act of [the] giving of one’s self… there are many people who have done that and, of course, why does Yondu do it or why does he tell him the truth? I think the big thing is he has to really.”
Rooker explains that Yondu has kept the reason why he took Peter then raised him himself a secret all these years. He finally reveals all to Peter not because he’s looking for some kind of redemption but rather because he’s been doing a little soul-searching, and it’s timely as the events of the film unfold.
Rooker says, “Obviously, Yondu’s going through something and I mean it’s sort of coming to a head, right, so it’s just one of those things – like when you’re filling the cup with water, it eventually has to spill over. So that’s what happened with Yondu I think.”
So there you go. You can watch the interview in the video above.
‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ is out now in the UK and hits US screens on May 5.