People Can’t Stop Talking About the Photos From Artemis II — and the Lack of Stars

On April 1, 2026, NASA launched its first manned mission to the moon in decades. And while the Artemis II was never going to make contact with the moon, the flyby was meant to do something so much more, and to help the space agency test some of the advanced technology it will need to begin work on a planned permanent settlement on the moon.

The world watched with bated breath as the four astronauts took off that day, and they've celebrated each milestone right alongside them.

That includes the moment when they traveled further than any human has ever gone before, when they successfully orbited around the moon and came out on the other side. However, it's the images that these astronauts have captured during the trip that are now garnering attention, as people from all over pore over the Artemis II pictures from space.

And while some fake photos have made the rounds on social media, there's one thing about the real photos that has everyone talking.

The four astronauts aboard the Orion capsule flying alongside the Artemis II may have gone where no man has gone before, but the rest of the world is getting a chance to see what they are seeing thanks to the photos they keep sending back to Earth. According to The Hill, some of the pictures include the Orientale basin, a part of the moon that human eyes have never been able to see before.

They also captured an image of the newly named Carroll crater.

While the crater had previously been documented, WBALTV NBC says the team asked if they could name it after Commander Reid Wiseman's late wife, Carroll, who had sadly died in 2020 after a long battle with cancer. "It's a bright spot on the moon," Jeremy Hansen said during a call with NASA. "And we would like to call it Carroll."

The emotional moment went viral online, and it was followed by comments about the "majestic view" and how many photos the team had captured during their flight.

While every photo coming out of the space mission has been eye-catching — and there will be more, according to The Hill, which reports that the crew is only able to send so many photos back to Earth due to the ship's bandwidth — there's one thing people can't stop talking about, and it's the lack of stars.

That's right, the photos coming from Artemis II don't appear to have any stars in them. And while conspiracies are running wild about that fact, there's a really interesting explanation.

The Hill says that no stars are visible in the photos because the crew has to adjust the exposure settings so that the light from the sun, which appears very bright thanks to their position in space, doesn't completely drown out the objects they are capturing. As such, the tiny specks of stars don't show up very well in the pictures.

But who knows what kinds of images will be found in the treasure trove of photos NASA will have access to once the astronauts return?

Maybe some of those will contain images of the stars. But for now, it's nice to keep seeing all of the stunning pictures coming back from the mission as the crew documents their record-breaking trip around the moon.