the movie begins with a young boy named Greg Heffley saying the book he is writing in is a journal and not a diary he says he specifically asked his mom not to get a book that wrote diary on it but she didn't listen he goes to school and a bully makes fun of him as he says he's with a diary Greg tries to explain that it's a journal but they push him to the ground and throw the book at him he says the only reason he writes in the book is because he is going to
be rich and famous when he grows up and people will want to know how he lived his life Greg says he's surrounded by morons but says his best friend rally is in the same school as he is he says he's glad that Rowley is with him and they play with a football as rally rides his tricycle Greg throws the ball but fails to get his Target which is rowley's tire and rally encourages him to try harder they talk about middle school and how it's different from elementary school Greg throws the ball at Rowley but Roderick
his elder brother causes him to miss and rally falls into a bush the ball lands in fragley's compound and fragley and emerges he asks Greg if he wants to enter his house for a play date but Greg refuses and tries to leave he gets on the road and rally hits him with his tricycle and knocks him down Greg returns to his house and sits in the dining Susan his mom gives them food and cleans his shirt because it is stained she asks him how he and Rowley feel about their first day of middle school and
says all he needs is a good friend she asks Roderick to tell Greg about middle school and Roderick says he should avoid touching the cheese on the floor he then says touching it will lead to having the cheese touch and the only way to get rid of it is to touch someone else Susan tells Greg to ignore what Roderick said and asks him not to tell Rowley because he will get scared Roderick realizes that rally is Greg's best friend and laughs at him as he says rally is an overgrown baby he says that Middle School
will eat rally alive and says Greg should abandon him if he wants to survive later Greg goes to Rally school and thinks about what Roderick told him he looks around Riley's room and sees that he is childish Greg tells rally that it's time they grow up and act their age he says they are in middle school and it's a scary place for mature people he panics as he mentions the things Roderick said and decides not to talk about the cheese Greg calms down and says the middle school will be fine and they do their special
handshake they make their way to school for the first day in middle school and are nervous as they enter the building they see a lot of weird things as they search for their locker but Greg comes rallied down they eventually find their locker and see that they are beside each other they find their schedule in the lockers But realize they don't have the same class the bell rings and a crowd of people moves Rowley as they go upstairs Greg enters his class and remembers roderick's advice to find a good seat he sits at the back
as the teacher re-enters and she realizes he is roderick's brother she asks him to sit in front of her and he is forced to sit close to fragley Greg says being popular is different in middle school because the fastest person is usually the most popular in elementary school he says he's trying to figure out where he fits in and says touching the cheese will make you the most unpopular person he and rally search for a free seat as they enter the cafeteria but don't find it anywhere and are forced to sit on this stage they
look around in search of free seats but the bell rings and they have to go to their next class Greg tells rally to keep a low profile and think of nice things rally then asks Greg if he wants to come over and play after school and everyone in the cafeteria laughs at them Rowley leaves the school as some students make fun of him and Greg meets him he tells rally that they hung out in middle school and did not play and they decide to go and play video games a few weeks later rally asks Greg
about what they'll wear for Halloween and Greg says they'll have to be invincible so no one knows they still go out trick-or-treating Greg wears a ninja costume but rally arrives wearing a bright night costume Susan emerges with with Manny and says Greg is the only one who's available to take him to trick-or-treating they go to several houses and ask for candy but the house owners don't give Greg any candy he stares at his bag and sees that he barely has any candy inside but sees that Manny and Rowley always get candy he sees a woman
give Manny a large candy bar and Manny places it in a sack Greg gets an idea and he and rally hide as they send Manny to collect candy for them they receive a lot of candy and Greg suggests they continue going to houses rally says Manny looks tired and confesses that he is exhausted Greg says they can get enough candy to last for the entire year if they keep going but rally doesn't seem interested he then says they can follow a shortcut to get to the houses and rally realizes he's talking about Snake Road Rally
gets scared but Greg assures him that nothing will happen and they decide to continue trick-or-treating they walk through Snake Road as Greg carries Manny on his head because he is asleep Rowley says he is scared and asks if the goat man is going to attack them Greg says the goat man isn't real and Roderick tells them a lie rally reminds Greg that Roderick wasn't lying about the cheese but they continue walking the duo hears a strange noise and hides behind a tree as a car that's full of teenagers passes by the teenagers see them and
decide to move to them because they can take their candy they ask Greg and rally for their candy but rally begins telling them how his parents gave out toothbrushes instead of candy Greg takes rally and tells the teenagers goodbye as they walk away but the teenagers ask them how they will feel if their candy gets wet they shoot at them with a fire extinguisher but rally defends them with his shield he and Greg begin running away but the teenagers pursue them they throw water balloons at Greg and Rowley but fall into a ditch and get
stuck the duo continues running and slides down a hill they then realize that they have arrived at Greg's house but Frank Greg's dad pours water as he mistakes them for being teenagers Susan emerges and asks them where they have been and Manny says that they walked through Snake Road Greg plays with Rowley as he says he was grounded from playing video games Rowley says he wants to sign up for a club but Greg says he isn't interested and wants to change his situation immediately they decide to play Rumble tricycle and rally rides down the hill
as Greg throws the football he hits the tricycle's front tire and rally falls to the ground and injures his hand Greg apologizes as he sits beside Rowley and says he can't get into more trouble because he's already grounded he convinced his rally to tell his parents that they were playing tag when he fell down and Rowley agrees later Greg talks to rally and rally says his hand is broken he says the doctors put a cast on his hand and Greg says a cast is the greatest thing to happen to a kid in school he says
everyone will want a simicast and will invite him to sit with them during lunch he then asks if his parents suspect what happened to his arm and says they'll have to have the same story to prevent their parents from finding out about the rumble tricycle Susan listens to their call and rally cuts the call as he panics she goes to Greg's room and scolds him for all the things he has done she then says that he should do the right thing as she says she's trying to raise a good son and leaves the room Greg
walks to Rally's house and says telling Rally's parents the truth is what Mom meant he says he doesn't want rally to get in trouble and eventually doesn't tell them the truth rally arrives at school the following day and everyone wants to sign his cast Greg meets rally in the cafeteria and sits beside him but gets pushed away by other students he tries to get their attention by saying he's the one who broke Rally's hand and they chase him away Greg tries to fake having a cast but no one pays attention to him and he decides
to do something as he sees a poster showing that the cartoonist position is open Rowley enters Greg house in season working on some comic ideas he asks if he can help but Greg says there's only one position left him he wants to work alone Rowley picks up one of the crumpled pages and laughs at the joke he sees on it Greg says he's using a different joke and asks him to draw his own comic if he wants rally leaves his house as he is sad and Greg turns in his comic Mr Humphreys the principal announces
that Greg is the new cartoonist and he's happy a bully pushes him with the ground and calls him a teacher's pet and Greg realizes that they changed the contents of his comic to help the school library he quit the position and the principal replaced him with Rowley Greg sees that the joke he abandoned is in the newspaper and everyone is giving Rowley credit for it he gets angry and confronts Rowley as he asks why he couldn't come up with an idea of his own Greg tells rally that he's tired of carrying him around and says
Rowley won't be where he is without him rally says he is in that position because Greg broke his arm and Greg walks away in anger but hits a bully and knocks down his food the bully gets angry and punches Greg in the face Greg walks home and says things between him and rally should go back to normal soon but they don't Rowley begins hanging out with a boy named Chi wrong and Greg decides to make him jealous he decides to have a sleepover at fragley's house and is terrified as he enters fragley startles him as
he runs up the stairs with a puppet and Greg reluctantly goes to his room fragley takes the chocolate that is in Greg's bag and it makes him hyperactive he chases Greg around the room with a booger on his nose and Greg locks himself in the bathroom he says he wishes he had forgotten everything that happened that night and accidentally touches the booger as he reads a letter that frankly left for him Greg goes to school and is sad as he eats lunch alone in the cafeteria he walks out of the school and rally walks to
him and says he wants to come over and take a video game he left Greg says the game has been at his house for a long time so it's his property and they begin to argue this students gather around as they argue and try to make them fight but run as the teenagers emerge in their car they walk to Greg and rally and hold them as they prepare to have their Revenge they see the cheese on the floor and the teenagers Force rally to take a bite out of it they push Greg to the cheese
but the gym coach emerges and chases the teenagers away the other students emerge and are disgusted as they realize someone took a bite out of the cheese everyone thinks Rowley ate the cheese but Greg decides to do the right thing and tells everyone he ate it everyone runs away and he and Rowley reconcile as they go home Greg says having the Cheese Touch isn't so bad because everyone gives him his space and he has a whole table to himself during lunch Ian Rowley continue being best of friends but he says he will tell everyone who
actually ate the cheese if rally steps out of line Greg continues writing in his journal but rally enter and they decide to play video games the end
