After 10 days of charming those tuned into social media and the NASA livestream with their scientific excitement and “moon joy,” the Artemis II crew returned to Earth with a splash on Friday evening.

During the course of their mission, the crew of four set records for the farthest that humans have ever traveled from Earth and for the first space-to-space call – when they chatted with the International Space Station. They took breathtaking photos: of Earth setting over the lunar horizon, of the Moon eclipsing the Sun, and of sides of the Moon that had never been seen with human eyes. The mission brought planetary geologists new images of the surface to study, NASA engineers new data about the performance of the launch system and crew capsule, and a slew of goofy, emotional and deeply human moments from the crew.

As the space editor for The Conversation U.S., I started working on Artemis II stories as far back as December 2025. Our authors wrote about everything from this mission’s salience in the context of space law and international relations to the decades of history that brought this crew to the launchpad, to how Artemis II parallels ideas described in a seminal science fiction novel from over 150 years ago.

For my latest story, Jennifer Levasseur, curator of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum, described how the photos the Artemis II crew took tell the story of their journey around the Moon and give spaceflight a new, clean look.

“While the Artemis II photos have similar timeless, classic elements to the Apollo photos, better photographic tools give them a clean, crisp vibe,” she writes. “Space travel post-Artemis II now looks more like many people may imagine it’s supposed to look: grand, adventurous, audacious, sublime.”

[ Science from the scientists themselves. Sign up for our weekly science email newsletter. ]