License Plates: 50-46

50: Florida

A lot of the license plates that I don’t like I can see a possible defense for. Or at least a state pride thing. But I can’t imagine anyone who owns a car in Florida doesn’t recoil in horror every time they have to look at this. I can deal with the oranges, I guess, though they’re a little big. But the dark green, especially transposed over light green, is 70’s fashion gross. Then we get the state website shoved in our face, in curved font, with a change in font size  just to make sure you know the name of the state is Florida, not MyFlorida. I like the mention of it being the sunshine state, but why is it in a different font than the website?  Just a disaster, through and through.

49: North Carolina

I’m not a big fan of this much red dominating anything, let alone a license plate. It’s a harsh color, and doesn’t compliment blue all that well. But it’s not just the colors here. The Wright Brother’s plane is good in theory, but on a license plate it’s just a mish-mash of lines that are covered up by the motto. As for the motto, even ignoring the fact that North Carolina may not have been the first state where a plane flight occurred, why is that something for a whole state to be proud of?  It’s not like the Wright Brother’s flight attempt was a huge event organized and funded by the North Carolina taxpayers. I like the wheat field idea, but it just doesn’t work in blue.

48: Maryland

I know I’ve complained about the colors so far, though black type on white background is really unimaginative. The shield, depicting the Maryland state flag, is actually a pretty cool idea. But I’m too annoyed by everything else. For starters, I think state names in curly font is not a good idea just for readability, though at least this one is not pure cursive. But what really gets my goat is the website. Not only are we needlessly repeating the state name a second time, they felt the need to include “www” as if there’s been a need to type those three letters in an address bar in the past decade. Finally, is it really that hard to find the official state website? They all end in dot gov, and the website is the first hit if you type “Maryland” into Google. What a waste of space. Seriously, take out the website all together and this plate would be middle of the pack.

47: Illinois

Uh oh, red lettering again. But that’s the least of my complaints here. The font for the license number is a bad choice, what with the number four being too stylistic for a cop to read at 80 miles per hour. And as I mentioned earlier, not a big fan of cursive for the state name. But the true tragedy is putting Lincoln’s mug right in the center. First, it’s not even centered correctly as the first number covers part of his forehead. But mainly I don’t want to see a face when I’m looking at a license plate. “Land of Lincoln” is also laughable, as if he’s wild game that can only be found in the deep Illinois woods. Lincoln wasn’t even born in Illinois, and didn’t live there until he was twenty-one!

46: Missouri

There’s a lot to like here initially. I dig the big clear font and the light, fading blue background. And I’ve always had a fondness for the state slogan “Show Me.” But the slogan is so tiny that unless you know it’s there, it’s going to be hard to see while driving.  And then we have the outline of the state. Eeg. Not only is it too big, it’s completely covered by the license number and looks really awkward in the background. Putting the license tab in the middle is kind of cool, but it’s very busy. And then we have the state bird, which honestly looks photoshopped. Get rid of the bird and the state outline, and put “Show Me” at the bottom, and we have a solid plate. But, alas.