Star Trek: Discovery Finally Confirms Ash Tyler's Real Identity

[Warning: This post contains spoilers from Episode 11 of Star Trek: Discovery, "The Wolf Inside." Read at your own risk.]

Sunday night's Star Trek: Discovery finally confirmed what many of us knew all along: Ash Tyler (Shazad Latif) is also the Klingon Voq.

The painful reveal occurred in a series of flashbacks that were triggered when Tyler came face-to-face with his Mirror Universe counterpart. They confirmed that Tyler was, indeed, completely transformed after surviving a process that can only be described as voluntary torture. [Latif also confirmed to TV Guide that Javid Iqbal, who is credited as Voq, is actually the name of his father who passed five years ago.]

Now awakened as Voq, he is disturbed to hear this version of himself preach a message of tolerance which clashes with the Klingon First agenda he and the other Klingons in our universe live by. "Looking in the mirror and seeing a corrupted version of his own soul triggers his real reaction," Latif tells TV Guide. And that very real reaction was to try and murder his alternate self in the name of Kahless.

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While it may come as a relief for fans who'd latched onto the heavily discussed theory, the revelation is an unwelcome complication for Discovery's chief of security. "It's gonna make him less stable at the moment," he explained. After murdering Dr. Culber (Wilson Cruz) and nearly killing Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) aboard the ISS Shenzhou, it's safe to say the unraveling has already begun.

But Tyler isn't the only one fighting with a painful past. The episode dropped the mother of all bombshells when it revealed Michelle Yeoh's Captain Philippa Georgiou as Emperor of the Terrans. Making her grand return to the series, the episode ends with Georgiou scolding Burnham for ignoring her orders.

Burnham, who's been plagued all season with the guilt of feeling responsible for Georgiou's death, is stunned to not only see her alive again but as the leader of an evil empire. And while this version is very different from the Georgiou she knew and respected, seeing the fallen Captain's face again might be an opportunity for Burnham to finally come to terms with her past.

Discovery boss Aaron Harberts tells TV Guide the Mirror Universe episodes are about second chances and "that is something that Burnham is going to be faced with in the near future."

New episodes of Star Trek: Discovery stream Sundays at 8:30/7:30c exclusively on CBS All Access.

(Full disclosure: TV Guide is owned by CBS.)