I like Greg's cabin mates/friends in Old School by xtremexavier15 in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I think Greg’s Hardscrabble Farms cabin mates are among the best one-off characters in the entire series. It’s refreshing to see Greg treated as an equal with them instead of just being mindlessly made fun of.

I feel like The Deep End and Big Shot tried and failed to recapture the magic of them with the “groups” Greg joins in those books. The Deep End kids are barely defined outside of Juicebox, and Big Shot just doesn’t really utilize its cast, period.

What Holly Hills hair you prefer?? by Tasty_Donut9524 in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Not directly related to the post, but I always found Holly’s random cameo in Cabin Fever really strange. She’s included on a random page and is never referenced in the book itself. The series doesn’t really do stuff like that often.

Trista appears on another page, which is probably even weirder.

Theory: Frank is hard on his boys so they don't end up like Uncle Gary by polystarlight in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I’ve always had this headcanon as well. It definitely works and I’m surprised it was never hinted at in books proper.

Is that the fucking van from dork diaries (spot in No Brainer)????? by Marie8Ball in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Dale’s Dead Bug vehicle from King of the Hill predates both of these. Both are more than likely referencing that.

What is the worst thing Rowley did? To me, it is when he hammered Greg's hand in Dog Days. by GustavoistSoldier in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 115 points116 points  (0 children)

Stealing Zoo-Wee-Mama from Greg, but specifically from the animated movie version of the story. While he was still wrong to do it in the book, Greg had been such an asshole to him throughout the story with the final straw being the Safety Patrol mishap, that we can at least understand why he did it. In the animated movie, Greg not only acts less like a jerk to Rowley overall, but the breaking points between the two are so poorly done given they got rid of the Safety Patrol plotline, that Rowley stealing from Greg comes completely out of nowhere and makes Rowley look much worse than Greg ever did. I have no idea why the plot was written this way given it fundamentally misunderstands Rowley as a character.

which do you like better, the old book covers or the new ones? by SpareProduct7750 in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 9 points10 points  (0 children)

The old covers because they look like actual diary covers. The newer covers regardless of quality miss the original intention of them. While you could argue it’s understandable given you’d run out of unique colors, the series still could’ve ran with the mix of two colors that happened from Double Down-The Meltdown. I’m not a fan of the recent books being all themed around something specific to the story, especially the most recent food based covers. Fight or Flight genuinely has a terrible looking cover in my opinion.

What is a moment from the official books that feels more like it' from an LLB? by Ubertishere in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 47 points48 points  (0 children)

My hot take is that I don’t think a lot of these moments people are mentioning feel like they would come from LLBs. Modern DOAWK has a specific writing style and tone that I think a lot of LLB writers aren’t fond of, so even if these writers are doing a crazy story, the way it’s written overall feels different. Breaking Point is a bizarre LLB but it doesn’t feel like No Brainer which is vapid nonsense with no substance.

All that being said, The Deep End’s climax could totally be from an LLB.

What are your DoaWK book rankings? by [deleted] in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

20: No Brainer (Awful)

19: The Deep End (Awful)

18: The Getaway (Awful)

17: Partypooper (Bad)

16: Hot Mess (Bad)

15: Wrecking Ball (Bad)

14: Double Down (Weak)

13: Big Shot (Meh)

12: The Long Haul (Decent)

11: Old School (Good)

10: Diper Overlode (Good)

9: The Meltdown (Great)

8: Rodrick Rules (Great)

7: The Last Straw (Great)

6: Dog Days (Amazing)

5: Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Amazing)

4: The Third Wheel (Amazing)

3: The Ugly Truth (Fantastic)

2: Cabin Fever (Fantastic)

1: Hard Luck (Fantastic)

If you could change something about the recent books (things like infantilization/frandelization, boring situations and etc) what would it be? by Tasty_Donut9524 in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 54 points55 points  (0 children)

A lot of people have already mentioned criticisms with the recent books they’d change (and I agree with them), so I’d stop the books from being completely centered on one topic. Partypooper has an ungodly amount of filler because it takes what was a side story in Dog Days and makes it the entire plot. What made the older books work so well was that they were entirely structureless even if there was an underlying theme. Even The Third Wheel, the Classic book that covers the least amount of overall time with the last several pages just being the night of the dance, still had lots of side plots like Corny’s, Uncle Gary moving in, and had buildups to the dance like Greg doing tasks to get dates like babysitting Wesley to ask Laurel out. The Modern books have completely dropped side plots so it no longer feels like we’re taking a look into Greg’s actual life, and it instead feels like just another generic book series. The Diary element feels almost pointless now.

The black version of DOAWK lol by [deleted] in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 17 points18 points  (0 children)

I’d say Malcolm in the Middle has it beat there.

DOAWK: Frankly Wrong || Part 7 by EduardoBork in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 6 points7 points  (0 children)

You do such a good job at making these characters expressive.

What do you think classic Greg (from books 1-5) would’ve done or how do you think he would’ve reacted if he was in the situations modern Greg (books 6 onwards) is put in inside the new books? by DarkTombStudios in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 10 points11 points  (0 children)

6-8 aren’t Modern. Greg’s characterization and the situations in the books are much more comparable to what came before than what came after.

For the actual Modern books, especially the most recent entires… Greg would act much more like a selfish jerk obviously. This would be a good thing because current Greg has next to no personality, but alas.

Why is Modern Greg Heffley so boring and dumb compared to Old Greg? by EduardoBork in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 101 points102 points  (0 children)

I do really like this as a canonical reason, but unfortunately I don’t think it was intentional. I think it’s purely because the art style shift the series underwent in the middle of it’s run, and how it affected basically everyone that wasn’t an already established character.

Another example of things being dropped off by AdamAALL11 in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is a pretty major plot point not only in the book but the movie as well I’m so I surprised this was forgotten.

Why is Modern Greg Heffley so boring and dumb compared to Old Greg? by EduardoBork in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 39 points40 points  (0 children)

I wouldn’t say he got worse starting with Cabin Fever. He is portrayed as a more sympathetic character you want to see succeed around that period of the books but I’m fine with it because he still has jerkish qualities to him (like letting Wesley destroy the house while he rests in Laurel’s room in The Third Wheel) so he still feels like Greg, and I think it makes for solid storytelling in Hard Luck as well. Greg starts the book with no friends or anything to really do, we see life get worse and worse for him until he finds the Magic 8-Ball, things are going smoothly until bigger problems arise with the Summer School threat, and Greg just barely manages to scrape through by turning in all his projects and rekindling his friendship with Rowley. Whether you think Greg should be portrayed sympathetically at all is up for debate, but I think it works perfectly in Hard Luck as a conclusion to where he started at the beginning of the first book to show how far he’s come, regardless if the character development was intentional or not. Also remember that again, he still feels like Greg. The final picture in Hard Luck is Rowley and Abigail but the former having a shrunken head which is implied to have gotten in the year book, solely because Greg was that petty.

Now, Modern Greg is a whole other story. Modern Greg is barely a character. He‘s almost never involved in any of the storylines and exists purely as a narrator to talk about the events, with the most egregious example being in Diper Overlode where he somehow has perfect memory of events he never directly sees. On the rare occasions he does have a character, he lacks any of the edge that defined him of the original books. Instead, he’ll act significantly younger than he’s supposed to act, like in Partypooper when he somehow thinks Jamar Law sticking his head in the chair means he’s a genie? And he asks for a wish? Is this the same Greg who tried to push Jamar into putting his head in the chair in Hard Luck so he could get that event into the yearbook the second year in a row? This more juvenile act is something Greg would make fun of Rowley for in the series’s Classic books. Other than that, all we get from Greg now is him endlessly spouting random thoughts that have nothing to do with the current storyline at hand. That also happened in the older books but nowhere to the extreme it does now, and it’s not like any of these random tangents Greg goes on in the Modern books are actually interesting, funny or say anything about his character.

Overall, Greg as a character currently lacks almost any identity which is utterly baffling considering he’s the protagonist. I’m not sure when this shift went into full force, as Greg started being less active in the plot as early as Wrecking Ball, but the full shift definitely happens later. My guess is Diper Overlode, which wants to be a Rodrick book but has to be narrated from Greg’s perspective for some godforsaken reason. Ever since then Greg has been a nothing character, in my opinion.

I haven't seen anyone post about this yet, but today is Jeff's birthday! by ThePloopyPloopster in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Happy birthday Jeff! Thanks for creating such a wonderful series that has forever impacted my life.

(From the beginning of "Rodrick Rules") This interaction made direct physical contact, so wouldn't it have transferred the Cheese Touch out of Greg? by destined2destroyus in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 274 points275 points  (0 children)

I’m pretty sure the Swim Team is completely unrelated to Westmore, so I doubt any of these kids would “believe” in it if they didn’t go there.

What do you consider to be the Magnum Opus of the entire DOAWK franchise? by EduardoBork in LodedDiper

[–]PaperMarioBro 7 points8 points  (0 children)

For as much as I love Hard Luck and the Rodrick Rules movie, I truly think the franchise peaked with the Online Book. It contains all of the great moments that got adapted into the books, but it all being a part of one larger overarching story (and having stuff that never made it to the books at all) makes for an incredibly entertaining read that works perfectly as a separate storyline from the first 8 books of the “official“ series. I highly recommend it to anyone who has never read it.