Why Tesla needs its cars to fly

October 22, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

Why Tesla needs its cars to fly

The Tesla Roadster reveal last week was undeniably cool: a car that climbed a vertical wall, drove upside down, and flipped over a line of other vehicles before landing. But as The Verge's Andy Hawkins explains, the demo was also deeply misleading—and the story of why Tesla spent nine years and countless broken promises to deliver a car that may never actually ship tells us something important about where the company is now.

The long, strange history of the Roadster

The Roadster was always Tesla's halo car. The first generation proved that an electric sports car could find an audience and led directly into the Model S. In 2017, Elon Musk unveiled a second-generation Roadster with jaw-dropping promises: zero to 60 in under one second, 600 miles of range, and a 2020 delivery date. At the time, Tesla had enormous goodwill. The Model 3 rollout, despite its production snags, looked like a genuine hit.

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What you'll learn

1 (03:47) **Tesla's Roadster Reveal: Flying Car or Marketing Stunt?** - David introduces the episode's main topic: the Tesla Roadster reveal event and the demo of a car that climbs walls and flies.
2 (05:55) **The Roadster's History: From First Car to Nine-Year Delay** - Andy explains the Roadster's evolution from Tesla's first car to the delayed "second generation" announced in 2017.
3 (08:52) **Why the Roadster Took Nine Years: Escalating Promises and Shifting Focus** - Andy explains the combination of factors that delayed the Roadster for nearly a decade.
4 (11:45) **The Launch Event: A Rad but Misleading Party Trick** - Andy describes the actual reveal event, calling it an "undeniably pretty rad" but misleading demo.
5 (15:40) **What Car Did We Actually See? A Hollow Demo Vehicle** - Andy reveals that the demo car likely bears little resemblance to a production vehicle.
6 (19:17) **The Terms and Conditions: Tesla Admits It May Never Ship** - Andy highlights a shocking detail from the Roadster's updated terms and conditions.
7 (23:55) **The Actual Street Car: Dead, Redesigned, and Downgraded** - Andy explains what little we learned about the production Roadster that might ship in 2028.

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Show Notes

Tesla recently showed off a new version of its Roadster. Well, a new version of its old version of the Roadster, anyway. But this one flies! The Verge's Andy Hawkins joins the show to explain the last decade of the Roadster saga, make sense of the flying and kickflipping new vehicle, and cast out into the future of Tesla's cars for humans. If there even is one.