'Star Trek: Discovery' Star Opens up on That Big Ash Tyler Reveal

Sunday's Star Trek: Discovery episode finally confirmed a longstanding fan theory. Now the actor at the center of that theory can open up about the big reveal.

SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery "The Wolf Inside" follow.

"The Wolf Inside" confirmed that Lt. Ash Tyler is actually the Klingon torchbearer Voq. Shazad Latif plays both characters and tells Variety the secrecy was extreme.

"It's been like a year's worth of secrecy now," Latif says. "It's been a year of keeping up a crazy secret that a lot of people figured out toward the end. That's always hard. I couldn't say anything. The whole set was quiet in general because it was Star Trek anyway. It was like being in the CIA."

To keep the reveal a secret, Discovery credited a fake actor with playing Voq in season one. Since Latif would be in layers of makeup, the theoryw as that no one would be able to tell. Fans managed to figure things out when Javid Iqbal had zero online presence, even on IMDB. Someone even set up a parody Twitter account.

Latif reveals that he was actually the one who got to name the fake actor. He used the name of his late father.

"I got to choose a pseudonym for this whole thing," Latif said. "My father passed away six years ago. He was a big film buff."

Even with his appearance and name hidden, Latif still had to make Tyler and Voq sound different.

"I wanted to give Voq a softness," Latif said. "He had a quiet sort of sentiment about him, an emotional character which bleeds into Tyler. That softness where everything just gets sort of coiled in the back of his throat, it felt right. Sometimes you're just practicing stuff in your room and then suddenly something clicks."

Tyler didn't remember that he was Voq until he came face to face with his mirror universe self, the Firewolf. Now everything has come back to him.

"I think he's realized he's bloody messed up, because if he'd got rid of Burnham and Saru hadn't come in, he could have completed his mission," Latif said. "He needs to get in to contact with L'Re'l. He's feeling like he's failed T'Kuvma, he's failed at all kinds of stuff. There's so many things going on in that one moment. It's quite brilliant."

New Star Trek: Discovery episodes become available to stream Sundays at 8:30 p.m. ET on CBS All Access.