YMMV / Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid

• Base-Breaking Character: Rowley. On one hand, you may feel bad for him due to the constant bullying and manipulation he receives at the hands of Greg. On the other hand, you may call him an idiot for defending Greg and continuing to be friends, even though any normal person in his situation would ditch Greg on cue.
• Esoteric Happy Ending: The ending happens where Rowley declares him and Greg best friends again, even though his parents tell him to find new friends. And they're right, considering that everything in the book just contributes to what a terrible person Greg is, actively tormenting Rowley for the entire story. The worst part is that Rowley's rationalization for him and Greg being best of friends is his misguided idea that if friends get on each other's nerves, then Greg being an outright jerk to him must mean they are the best of friends. It reads just like someone getting back into an abusive relationship, and given that the series is known for a lot of Alternate Character Interpretation, it's unclear if Kinney wants the audience to think it's a good ending or to outright laugh and pity Rowley for being dumb enough to continue being Greg's friend.
• Fridge Brilliance: Why is Greg so much more of a jerkass in this book than he is in the main series? Well, at the beginning of the first book, Greg says that when he becomes famous, he plans to use his journals to answer interviewers' questions. It's likely he is downplaying his jerkass moments so people will like him better.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: At the end, Rowley thinks that he'll release a book called The Spooky Adventures of Greg and Rowley. Two years later, Awesome Friendly Kid got a sequel called Rowley Jefferson's Awesome Friendly Spooky Stories.
• Older Than They Think: Before it became a full-fledged book, the expanded version of The Wimpy Kid Do-It-Yourself Book that was released eight years prior had a section called Diary of an Awesome, Friendly Kid, which is written in a similar style as this book. However, the text is in cursive and the drawings are in full-color.
• The Scrappy: Greg in this book is seen as this with how much of a Jerkass he is in the entire book as his mistreatment of Rowley is turned up to eleven, and he doesn't really do much in this book other than just being a jerk to Rowley. It was so bad that even fans began to say that Rodrick was a less terrible person than Greg.
• Take That, Scrappy!: Rowley hits Greg with his book after the latter insults him.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • This book only contains Call Backs to the first book and The Meltdown, alongside small Continuity Nods to The Ugly Truth and Cabin Fever. The events of the other books are never referenced, which would be a cool idea to see the moments from Rowley's perspective given how Greg is obviously downplaying his jerkass moments to look more likable, and we could have seen those moments from Rowley's more truthful perspective.
  • The appeal of the book is that we get to see these familiar characters in Rowley's style, but the book focuses only on Greg, Rowley and their parents. Rodrick appears three times, Manny appears twice, and Scotty Douglas appears once.
  • Given the fact that the majority of the book is enforcing the fact that Greg treats Rowley like garbage, one would come to conclusion that the Aesop would be either to stand up for yourself (for Rowley) or to learn not be such a Jerkass (for Greg). Nothing of it happens and it's unclear if the audience is supposed to be touched that Rowley decided to get back with his abusive friend by rationalizing the abuse as something that friends supposedly do or consider it a Downer Ending where we're meant to laugh and lament Rowley's foolishness.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: The entire book consists of Rowley being taken advantage of by his Jerkass best friend, yet still being friends with him even though it's clear that he's not the kind of person he should be hanging around. It's also unclear if Kinney intends for Rowley deciding to be Greg's friend again under the false assumption that friends are supposed to actively torment each other is supposed to be a happy ending or a bittersweet or outright Downer Ending where we're supposed to laugh or pity Rowley for being so foolish.