Warning: This Article Contains MAJOR SPOILERS for Star Trek: Section 31
The villain in Star Trek: Section 31 resolves a deep cut mystery from Star Trek: Discovery season 3. Section 31 brings back Michelle Yeoh as Star Trek: Discovery‘s Emperor Philippa Georgiou, and introduces a ragtag team of Section 31 agents led by Alok Sahar (Omar Hardwick). Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi and written by Craig Sweeny, Star Trek: Section 31 sees the black ops division go after a mysterious villain who has Emperor Georgiou’s mᴀssively destructive Godsend weapon. The Godsend is a universe-obliterating artifact from Georgiou’s rule over the Terran Empire that should’ve been destroyed, not posing a threat to the Prime Universe.
Star Trek: Discovery season 3’s 900-year leap forward displaced Emperor Georgiou from both Star Trek‘s Mirror Universe and the mid-23rd century, resulting in physical pain and flashbacks. In Georgiou’s memories, she kneels over the wounded body of a masked man, a bloody knife on the ground. Before the Guardian of Forever (Paul Guilfoyle) cures Georgiou by sending her back to Star Trek‘s 24th century when the Prime and Mirror Universes were closer together, Philippa reflects on the empathy that Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) taught her, saying, “I wish I’d learned all this before now. I had a chance, once, long ago. He was called San.”
Star Trek: Section 31 Pays Off Georgiou’s Story About San From Discovery
San Being In Section 31 Raises More Questions Than Answers
Star Trek: Section 31‘s villain, San (James Hiroyuki Liao) pays off a mystery from Emperor Georgiou’s past that was only briefly alluded to in Star Trek: Discovery season 3. Star Trek: Section 31 confirms that Philippa’s lost love and the ᴅᴇᴀᴅ masked man from Georgiou’s flashbacks are both San. San first appears wearing the same mask from Georgiou’s flashbacks, indicating he isn’t as ᴅᴇᴀᴅ as Georgiou believed. Neither is the Godsend, which Georgiou ordered destroyed after having it commissioned. The reappearance of the Emperor’s two biggest Terran regrets should force Georgiou to reckon with the consequences of her actions.
Emperor Georgiou’s flashbacks to San’s death occur in Star Trek: Discovery season 3, episode 6, “Scavengers”, and Star Trek: Discovery season 3, episode 8, “The Sanctuary”.
Unfortunately, San being the villain of Star Trek: Section 31 raises more questions than it answers. Section 31‘s villain is 65 years late crossing from the Mirror Universe to the Prime Universe, with no indication of how San knew where—or when—to find Emperor Georgiou. Georgiou’s Discovery flashbacks imply she murdered San with a knife, but Star Trek: Section 31 shows San perishing at Emperor Georgiou’s feet after poisoning himself. These inconsistencies might have been clues to Section 31‘s mystery arc when it was a series, but as a movie, they’re frustrating artifacts of the story we didn’t get.
What Section 31 Revealed About Emperor Georgiou In The Mirror Universe
Georgiou Killed So Many People To Become Emperor—But San Wasn’t One Of Them
The opening scenes of Star Trek: Section 31 give us stark reveals about Emperor Georgiou’s Mirror Universe childhood, and the circumstances surrounding her ascent to the Terran throne. In the Terran Empire, young Philippa Georgiou (Miku Martineau) and San (James Huang) are the last two teenagers standing in Star Trek‘s own Hunger Games, where the prize was becoming the new Emperor. Georgiou, not San, has the tenacity to complete the final test by poisoning her own family, and scarring San as a slave. As the Emperor’s vᴀssal, San was tasked with creating the Godsend, but he retaliated by poisoning himself before Georgiou’s eyes.
The inherent cruelty of the Mirror Universe means Emperor Georgiou couldn’t have actually changed the rules. Georgiou had to kill her family because the Emperor must be loyal to Terra only, so openly loving San would have doomed him to the same terrible fate. Nothing in San and Philippa’s backstory matches Georgiou’s Discovery flashbacks exactly, and San’s (actual) death means an explanation won’t be coming in a Star Trek: Section 31 sequel. Instead, Star Trek: Section 31 answers Georgiou’s Discovery mystery by saying Georgiou’s guilt made her feel as though she actually did kill San with her own hands.
