Volkswagen to stop making the VW Beetle

Picture me, age 23. I'm shopping around for my first Adult car. While on the Volkswagen lot, surveying sensible Jettas and Passats, a round, enticing shape catches my eye: the Beetle.

Should I? Do I dare? I'm tempted. It's just so freaking cute! And fun! I run my hand along its rotund bumper, picture it in candy apple red, baby blue... yellow! Highway 1, here I come!

No. No, no, no. This car is far too frivolous. I am a Young Professional now! I need something sleeker, more New Me, not old (young) me. Look, that black Jetta is just right.

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I imagine internal monologues like mine — where drivers decide they'd look just a little too silly driving a Bug — are at least partially responsible for Volkswagen's recent decision: to kill, once and for all, the Beetle. The beloved VW Bug.

The VW Beetle is being put out to pasture again.

IMAGE: TIM GRAHAM/GETTY IMAGES

On Friday, Motor Authority broke the automaker's news that VW won't produce and sell The Bug anymore. After this generation of Beetle runs its course, VW will shut down production, with no re-vamped models in the pipeline.

It was rumored Volkswagen was working on an electric Beetle. But VW chairman Herbert Diess quashed that rumor like an insect under his boot. Instead, the automaker's "emotional" car will be a re-tooled Microbus. Guess you have all those #VanLife 'grammers to thank for that.

There's no concrete timeline for when VW will sell its last Beetle, but Motor Authority estimates VW dealerships will likely sell the car for a few more years since the new Microbus isn't slated to come out until 2021 or so.

So farewell to that teenage dream, that embodiment of sass-en-auto, the cutest lil' car that ever did drive. RIP, VW Bug.

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