30 Days Of 2013 Ram 1500: Gas Mileage, So Far
As we roll through our 30-day road test of the 2013 Ram 1500, we're ready to file our first report... Read More
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STYLING | 9 out of 10
Expert Quotes:
Gone is the syrupy-cute, large-bubble-eating-a-smaller-bubble look, replaced by a design with a flatter, lower roof, a flatter, longer hood, and tauter sheetmetal that looks like someone popped a pressure-relief valve and bled off a couple dozen psi.
Car and Driver
The dashboard and instrument cluster are quite attractive, looking both purposeful and chic, and, Volkswagen claims, evocative of the original Bug.
Motor Trend
Gone is the Astrodome roof line. Gone is the push-me pull-you front-to-rear symmetry. Gone is the arcing windshield covering a dash so broad you could play foosball on it.
Inside Line
At one point – strike us dead for it – we found ourselves looking through the camera's viewfinder, only to get an impression in our mind that wouldn't go away. Looking up from the camera and staring at the Beetle's profile, we whispered, "PT Cruiser."
Autoblog
One thing is for sure: There's no bud vase this time.
Automobile
Remember the happy-go-lucky days before gender studies assigned identities to everything? Back then, the VW Beetle was neuter, and unaffected by it.
With the New Beetle, VW tackled a new identity, a feminine, friendly one. Ever see the anti-war ads with a flower stuck in a gun? The New Beetle had a flower stuck in the middle of its dash, in a standard bud vase that forever slurred it as a "chick car."
Now the Beetle's swinging in the other direction, with a masculine style we can't help but think has been handed down from the Audi TT, which is at the end of its meaningful sales life. The Beetle's roof has been flattened, its body drawn longer, its haunches widened, almost all the semicircles and demilunes erased from its form. In their places, a flatter hood and a steeper windshield that shrinks the gulf between the driver and the glass. Even its wheel arches seem less perfectly round than before. Turbo models wear a black-topped rear spoiler, and big Turbo graphics, xenon headlights, and wheels up to 19 inches across.
The Beetle's cabin has some new playful flair. The gauges are framed by a flat-bottom steering wheel on Turbo models, and most versions have body-color plastic panels accenting the dash, though Turbo owners can opt for a carbon-fiber-look material that will date many a car of the past decade one day, it's become so prevalent, and so cliched. It's less easy to see, more a feeling, but the Bug's more upright interior is the most evocative piece, not the little fillips of aluminum trim on the secondary glovebox, doors and steering wheel.
Conclusion
The 2012 VW Beetle swings to the masculine side of the styling spectrum, and knocks down the pricey Audi TT in the process.
