‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: The Getaway’ Trailer Drops, and the Heffleys’ Holiday Escape Gets Release Date

Some holiday traditions involve lights and hot cocoa, and for a lot of families, a new animated Greg Heffley adventure on Disney+ has joined that list. Jeff Kinney’s disaster-prone middle schooler has become a December fixture, with every earlier animated film arriving in the final month of the year. ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: The Getaway‘ is the next entry in that streak, and it is a very different kind of holiday trip.

The new movie is the fifth animated film in the franchise, yet it adapts the twelfth book in Kinney’s series, which first reached shelves in November 2017. That makes it a bit of a throwback within the current run of films. Before it, the franchise’s Disney+ era has included ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever’ in 2023 and ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw’ in 2025.

Now Disney has finally pulled back the curtain with the first full trailer and a new poster for the special. The trailer, released on Wednesday, confirms that the animated holiday comedy will land exclusively on Disney+ in early December. It follows a short teaser that was shown at stops on Kinney’s book tour.

First trailer for ‘DIARY OF A WIMPY KID: THE GETAWAY.’ Releasing on Disney+ on December 4. https://t.co/cNSVaA8UfL

— The Hollywood Handle (@HollywoodHandle) November 4, 2026

The premise is classic Wimpy Kid chaos. With the stress of the season closing in, the Heffley family makes a last-minute decision to escape to an all-inclusive resort, much to Greg’s dismay. Anyone who has tried to book travel in the middle of the holidays will recognize how quickly that kind of plan can unravel.

The footage leans into the festive mess, with a Christmas tree wrapped in colorful lights and a vacation setting that contrasts sharply with the snowed-in house of ‘Cabin Fever’. Disney describes the film as an animated holiday comedy, and the tone looks aimed squarely at the same family audience that has made the franchise a reliable streaming staple. The movie carries a PG rating for mild rude humor.

Matt Danner returns to the director’s chair after helming ‘The Last Straw’, while Kinney wrote and produced the film himself. Danner’s résumé also includes ‘Night at the Museum: Kahmunrah Rises Again’. Kinney’s screenwriting credits already cover multiple Wimpy Kid films, giving the series a steady creative backbone from one chapter to the next.

Early casting information points to familiar voices. Chris Diamantopoulos, Erica Cerra and Hunter Dillon are listed in the cast, and they previously voiced Frank, Susan and Rodrick in ‘Cabin Fever’. Other roles have not been widely detailed yet.

The franchise has bounced between formats over the years. Several live-action films came first, followed by a run of animated features from Disney that began in 2021 with the original ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ and continued with ‘Rodrick Rules’ in 2022. Each of those animated entries has been produced by Walt Disney Pictures, with Bardel Entertainment providing animation services on several of them, and Kinney has stayed involved as a producer throughout.

Disney has also tied the movie to Kinney’s publishing machine. A special movie tie-in cover for the book arrives alongside the release, and the studio revealed the project in the lead-up to the author’s recent book tour. That kind of cross-promotion is a reminder that the Wimpy Kid brand works as both a bookstore and a streaming draw.

Annual specials are a quiet but powerful tool for streamers, especially when they target families looking for something new to pull up between school pageants and gift wrapping. With this entry, Disney+ continues a tradition that fans have come to expect, and the previous films remain available to stream for anyone who wants a marathon first.

For longtime readers, the real draw may be seeing the Heffley family’s resort misadventure brought to life in motion. The trailer suggests the movie is ready to deliver the same mix of awkward humor and family chaos that the books are known for, and it gives younger viewers a fresh holiday story to settle in with.

Have something to add? Let us know in the comments!