Close to, different grille and my license plate has a V at the start.
Yes and no. That was already on there, I didn't change or add that. It was like that when I bought the car.
I'm not hugely cluey when it comes to this sort of stuff (still elarning) but one thing that comes to mind is maybe your previous transmission had a shift kit in it and the one you swapped into it doesn't. I know a lot of people with autos seem to do it as it's a good bang for buck upgrade. Just a thought.
Tinting taillights is legal yes. I believe your brake lights just need to still be visable from a certain distance away so providing they're not too dark they would be fine. I can not however confirm or deny whether the 20% or 35% are legal. As for having more cop attention, someone on the fb group I also posted this to said he's been running tinted taillights for over 3 years and has never had an issue with cops. Don't drive like a dick and you would be fine I would imagine.