Renuka Veerasingam believes Elon Musk is humanity’s last hope. “I want to go to Mars, and he is going to take us,” she says. “Space is the final frontier. It’s in our DNA to find the final frontier—to keep going until we get to the edge.” Though Veerasingam is 140 million miles from Mars, she is currently on the edge of Santa Monica Boulevard and North Orange Drive, in the heart of Hollywood, for the opening of the new Tesla Diner, modeled in the likeness of the same kind of retro-futuristic space station she one day dreams of inhabiting on the Red Planet. An actress who lives in Toluca Lake, Veerasingam wanted to see Musk’s latest window into the future up close. Every one of the 200-plus people assembled have their reason for coming, many seemingly curious to find out what the seeming Midas touch of Musk has to offer on a Tuesday afternoon in July. Musk first announced his plans for the diner in 2018 on Twitter—before he bought the company and rebranded it as X—saying that he wanted to “put an old school drive-in, roller skates & rock restaurant at one of the new Tesla Supercharger locations in LA.” So far this is the only location, but he has plans to expand to other cities if it’s successful. PHOTOGRAPH: ETHAN NOAH ROY PHOTOGRAPH: ETHAN NOAH ROY That vision came to life at exactly 4:20 pm Monday, a cherished stoner reference of Musk’s and one that probably peaked when he was still in college. WIRED’s photographer, Ethan Noah Roy, was there when the doors opened, meeting a man who had dedicated the last 13 years of his life to work at Tesla with the sole purpose of meeting Musk. “That has yet to happen,” he said. I arrive in the middle of the lunch rush, around 1 pm the following day, with some 80 other people waiting to get in. In the parking lot, there are 80 v4 Supercharger stalls— “the largest urban Supercharger in the world,” according to Tesla—and two 45-foot movie screens that showed a selection of movies, TV clips, and Tesla ads. Episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation play as servers on roller skates hand out free ice cream to people waiting in line. For now, parking only accommodates Teslas and other EVs. Customers with gas-powered cars were instructed by security to park on the street. After 30 minutes of light conversation—“He makes himself hard to like,” one young woman, who asks not to be identified, says of Musk—I make it inside.