Right before Greg Heffley leaves on his first day of seventh grade, Susan, Greg's mother, who writes a parenting column in the local newspaper, tells Greg and his older brother, Rodrick, who picks on Greg, that they need to spend more time together, and incentivizes them with money. When Greg returns home, a local talent show is advertised on TV, and Rodrick sees it as the big break for his band, Löded Diper. At church the following Sunday, Rodrick stains Greg's pants with chocolate, humiliating Greg and causing a public scuffle between them, ruining Susan's reputation.
As punishment, Susan, Greg's father Frank, and younger brother Manny go on a trip to the water park, Rockin’ Rapids, without Greg and Rodrick, leaving them home for the weekend to work on their differences; they are instructed not to invite anyone over. Ignoring this, Rodrick throws a wild party which Greg and Rowley end up participating in. The next morning, Greg and Rodrick receive a voicemail from Susan and Frank, informing them that they will be returning early from their trip due to Manny being ill, prompting them to hastily clean up the trashed house. They find that someone wrote: "Rodrick Rules" on the bathroom door in permanent marker. Greg gets the idea to replace it with the door to the basement. However, after their family gets home, they realize that the replacement door does not have a lock on it.
Rodrick tells Greg to deny everything, but Susan soon realizes the lock is gone and confronts Greg over it. Greg confesses that Rodrick had people over, but lies saying it was only a band practice and begs Susan not to punish Rodrick, believing it would ruin their improving relationship. So, Susan agrees to this, and Rodrick, believing Greg kept their secret, gains respect for his younger brother. The two start spending more time together, and Rodrick gives Greg advice on school and girls, though most of it backfires.
At school, Rowley and Greg joke about Chirag being invisible. After learning about this, Chirag waves his corndog in Rowley’s face which Greg grabs and gobbles down. He then disguises himself as Holly and tricks Greg into meeting him in the art room. Later that night, Rodrick takes Greg for dinner and plays pranks on other people. When they return home, Frank plans to show a slideshow of his civil war figurines to Susan's editors, who are visiting the Heffley household, he ends up finding pictures of Rodrick's party. Susan's reputation is ruined again. Frank grounds Greg for a couple of weeks while Susan grounds Rodrick for a month and forbids him from participating in the talent show, which leaves him distraught. Having learned that Greg partially admitted the truth to Susan earlier on, Rodrick states that they may be brothers, but will never be friends.
Greg and Rodrick are punished further by being forced to spend the weekend with their grandfather at his retirement home, much to their dismay. However, Greg runs into Holly Hills, his new classmate whom he has a crush on, visiting her grandmother; Holly also turns out to be the middle child between a malicious older sibling and spoiled younger sibling, so she and Greg become good friends.
At the talent show the next week, Rodrick finds out that he has been kicked out of his own band by Bill Walter, a guitarist he recently recruited, and Rowley is not able to perform his magic act due to his assistant having stage fright. Having witnessed the entire conflict and feeling sorry for Rodrick, Greg strikes a deal with Susan that he will stand in as Rowley's assistant if she lets Rodrick perform, which she agrees to. Despite multiple mishaps, "the Remarkable Rowley" is praised by the audience, including Holly, believing the act is actually a comedy skit and the mistakes are intentional, but they aren't as impressed by Löded Diper until Susan starts dancing at the edge of the stage, prompting the crowd to join in. Frank tapes the footage of Susan dancing and he and Greg agree to keep it a secret. Rodrick kicks Bill out of the band in retaliation and reconciles with Greg.
In a mid-credits scene, Greg and Rowley upload the footage of Susan dancing onto YouTube, which goes viral. Rodrick, having learned about this, shouts "Greg, you are so dead!".
Jakob Davies as Scotty Douglas, Rowley's former assistant who was replaced by Greg due to stage fright.
Serge Houde as Mr. Salz, an editor for Susan's column.
Teryl Rothery as Mrs. Kohan, another editor for Susan's column.
Kevin Kazakoff and Michelle Harrison as a rich couple with no children who appear in Greg's fantasy.
Graeme Duffy as the Master of Ceremonies, a host for Plainview's Most Talented.
Melissa Roxburgh as Rachel Lewis, one of the girls at Rodrick's house party.
Maple Batalia as Melissa, one of the girls at Rodrick's house party.
Dalila Bela as Taylor Pringle, a rude and unforgiving girl who celebrated her birthday at the roller rink at the beginning of the film.
Ben Hollingsworth and Elysia Rotaru as Terence and Ingrid, a couple who appear in a fictional horror movie called The Foot. They are shown screaming with bad lip movements.
Brenda Anderson, Doreen Ramus, Betty Phillips, Tae Helgeth, Sheila Paterson and Monica Marko as Mrs. Fiorkowski, Mrs. Cabbage, Mrs. Evesham, Mrs. Tan, Mrs. Bingham and Mrs. Anholtz, respectively, old women in the ladies' restroom who think Greg is a Peeping Tom.
Jeff Kinney, the series' author, makes a cameo as Holly's father.
Production
Brad Simpson stated he anticipated a sequel movie if the first film is a success. "Our writing staff are writing a sequel right now, "Rodrick Rules," which would be based on the second book"..."And, you know, we hope that the people to see a second movie, so that we are in position of going again right away and making another film. I certainly know that the fans would like to see all the books made into movies." Fox 2000 greenlit the sequel and Zachary Gordon returned as Greg Heffley. Steve Zahn (Frank Heffley) and Rachael Harris (Susan Heffley) also returned. The film was directed by David Bowers and the screenplay was written by Gabe Sachs and Jeff Judah. Principal photography began in Vancouver August 2010. A few new characters appeared in the film, including Peyton List as Holly Hills. The trailer was seen with Gulliver's Travels. The website created for the first was updated for the sequel featuring pictures of the cast and a short synopsis of the film. The film was released on March 25, 2011. Talks of a sequel were announced after the release of the first, but was not officially announced until May 12, 2010, announcing that it would be released March 25, 2011.[6] Filming took place in Vancouver, British Columbia and New Westminster, British Columbia from August 23 to October 27, 2010.[7] The mall scene was filmed at Park Royal Mall in West Vancouver.[8] The roller rink scene was filmed at the PNE Agrodome, due to Vancouver lacking a real roller rink. Director Thor Freudenthal was replaced by director David Bowers (director of Flushed Away by Aardman, the creators of Wallace and Gromit, and the film adaptation of anime cybernetic superhero kid Astro Boy).
Marketing and release
The trailer was shown with Gulliver's Travels on December 25, 2010. It was later online on January 3, 2011. A poster was released there after on January 14, 2011. In February 2011, an exclusive online-only trailer was released on the "Wimpy Kid Movie" YouTube channel, officialwimpmovie. Due to the success of the first film in Singapore, the film was released there eight days before the US release on March 17, 2011. It was released in Brazil on September 16, 2011.[9] A TV spot of the movie was released in March 2011.
Home media
The film was released on a stand-alone DVD, a special edition double DVD pack, and a Blu-ray/DVD/digital copy combo pack on June 21, 2011. One of the bonus shorts was shown during iParty with Victorious on Nickelodeon at 8:00 PM on June 11, 2011.
Reception
Box office
The film made $7.3 million on its opening day, ranking #2 behind Sucker Punch. It managed to rank #1 in the weekend box office.[10] In the UK, it debuted at #3 in the weekend box office behind Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and The Hangover Part II.
The film eventually grossed $52,698,535 in the US and Canada and $19,718,859 in other countries for a worldwide total of $72,417,394.[3]
Critical reception
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 47% based on 100 reviews and an average rating of 5.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Moderately witty and acceptably acted, Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2 isn't much worse than the first installment."[11] On Metacritic, it has a score of 51 out of 100 based on 23 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[12] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it an average grade of "A−" on an A+ to F scale.[13]
Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a positive review saying, "Director David Bowers keeps things peppy and brightly lighted, but its swiftest pleasures come from moment-seizing cast members." Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it a positive review saying, "A little less wimpy, gives value lessons to the watchers from the cast, and still pretty funny" and a B rating. Pete Hammond of Boxoffice magazine gave it a mixed review stating "Even better than the first edition, in its own sitcom-ish ways." However, Michael O'Sullivan of The Washington Post gave it a negative review, stating "You can't fault the filmmakers for reshaping a diary into a cohesive film. You can however, fault them for taking one of the great antiheroes in preteen literature and turning him into, well, an even wimpier kid."[14]
On October 23, 2021, Jeff Kinney revealed that sequels to the 2021 Diary of a Wimpy Kid reboot film for Disney+ are already in development.[16][17] On Disney+ Day 2021, Kinney revealed that the first sequel, based on Rodrick Rules, is set to be released in 2022. A poster was released on September 12, 2022, announcing the film's release date of December 2, 2022.[18]
