How did Ilayathalapathy Vijay become popular in Kerala?

1. majority of kerala understand tamil
2. vijay can dance well :D
3. he is a humble person
4. Vijay isnt a muscular hunk or someone with extra ordinary charms or looks, still he managed to get to the top through sheer hardwork. everyone respects the fact.
5. vijay fans are mainly the young people. his dialogues ,dance moves and fight sequences can really make them go crazy

Majority of Keralites see and can understand at least films from primarily 4 languages (Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil and English). So all these movies are released in theatres here. And hence we love heroes from all these languages.

Some of us even see Kannada, Telugu, Bengali and world films (like Korean, Spanish, German etc). One famous director once said Malyalais/Keralites see a Malayalam film as a Malayali, Tamil films as Tamizhan and English Movies as an American. So we morph into that mood when seeing a movie from these languages. We even have fans clubs for Tamil actors here. Vijay, Ajith's and Surya's being the prominent.

And to your particular question, how Vijay became so popular.

The first movie that made Vijay a popular face among Keralites was Thulladha Manamum Thullum (1999). I guess it was the same that did the same for him in Tamil Nadu. The songs were an instant hit, the story was good and people liked Vijay's energy. So people looked forward to his movies more.

The movies that followed moulded him as agood dancer and fighter and an actor with style, which most of us would like to associate to. 

Movies like Kushi (2000), Ghilli (2004) etc added to this effect, so people were even ready to accept his Madurey (2004) (even when the movie was full of stupid stunts) just for the sake of fun and entertainment.

The recent movies like Pokkiri (2007) and Thuppakki (2012) brought him back from flops. Also him pairing with the state's most loved actor and hero Mohanlal in Jilla (2014) pulled in more fans.

But better than anything else, whenever he did an interview in local TV or magazine in Kerala he gave out an aura of a humble family person even in the midst of such a big fame.

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