Star Trek: 8 Things The Kelvin Timeline Movies Got Wrong

This is low hanging fruit but, over a decade later, the lens flares in Star Trek (2009) are still a thing.

Behind the scenes footage shows JJ Abrams actually pointing a flashlight at the camera to achieve the effect and the sets are littered with spotlights with no apparent function other than to create lens flares. On the up side, they're a distinguishing visual characteristic of Abrams' two installments in the Kelvin Timeline Trilogy, apparently indicating just how bright the future is by shining literal light in the camera's lens. On the downside, they're distracting as hell.

By the time Star Trek Into Darkness hit theaters, the lens flares had become a problem. According to Abrams on the commentary track for Into Darkness, the lens flares were so intense that ILM had to go through the unenviable task of removing them with CGI. Looking back these films today, they're attractively produced and impeccably designed; they didn't need the added visual interest (or distortion) the lens flares created.

They're also a legacy that persists to this day. While Justin Lin's Star Trek Beyond rightly more or less left the lens flares to Abrams, both Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard use them in their own visual language. Apparently lens flares are as integral to the Star Trek Universe as they are the cinematic tomes of Michael Bay.