Incredible. It feels me with so much joy that JWT has been such a resounding success - I was so afraid the mission would fail somehow. The images we've gotten have changed the entire landscape.
One is that the rings aren't circular in the picture, because they're slightly oblique to the viewpoint, but your brain expects to see round circles, so it compensates by distorting your perception of the planet relative to the rings.
Two is the planet actually isn't round, because of its equatorial bulge, which in this image is slightly more in the up-down direction than left-right, because of the obliquity of the viewpoint. This effect is in the same direction as the rings perception effect and stacks with it.
Pictures of ringed planets are not usually rotated any more than this picture is. (Solar system pictures are typically rotated so that "up" is perpendicular to the ecliptic.) It's just that Saturn's (and Neptune's) axial tilt is fairly moderate (27° and 28° respectively) while Uranus is unique in having a tilt of almost 100°.
Maybe it's an optical illusion? When I look closely, the planet looks pretty round to me. The rings around it or the color gradient of the planet may affect the perception of its shape.
Evidence of extreme rearrangement in early solar system history, it is spinning sideways as compared to the ecliptic (the plane the solar system is on).
There is suspicion the planets were not always in the same order they are in today.
Telescope time for JWST is allocated based on scientific proposals. So yes there is to be some obvious scientific justification for observation of Uranus. This is the news release associated with these images.
JWST observation calendar is so tightly booked (demand vastly exceeds supply) that there's essentially no time to waste on anything that has low or no scientific value. Pretty pictures for public outreach are just a nice side effect.
