This whole
softcore decontamination scene really needs to be addressed more fully, for it is perhaps the most wonderful part of the entire show.
The setup is that an away team has just returned from visiting an alien world. Two of the team's members are the scorchingly hot female Vulcan science officer T'Pol, and the ruggedly handsome human firebrand Charles Tucker III, who have been bickering constantly throughout the episode so we know something's gonna happen with these two.
So the away team returns, and the ship's doctor immediately informs T'Pol and Tucker that they alone of the group have picked up some sort of alien spore and they must be decontaminated. Our first reaction is "Huh?', followed by "Okay, whatever." After all, this is Star Trek, and we expect the sudden appearance of bizarre plot devices to keep things moving along. The doctor sends them to a sealed room where they must apply a decontaminating gel to themselves.
They enter the room and two notable things happen:
- The normal lights go out and a soft blue glow, much like that which illuminates made-for-cable soft porn, floods the scene.
- We become aware that T'Pol is wearing a thin tank top and stretchy shorts, and Tucker is wearing only a pair of tight briefs which give us a largely unobstructed view of his batch.
And then they rub this gel all over each others' bodies, till they are all slippery and glistening and T'Pol's headlights are on.
I seem to remember they were arguing during this scene too, but frankly I don't remember much of the dialogue at this point. The bit was just so brazenly cynical and manipulative, it was beautiful. Lest some deep-seated inner fanboy longing remain unstirred, they even had Tucker sensuously rub gel on T'Pol's delicately pointy Vulcan ears.
A scene later, we see the ship's captain in his quarters, pacing back and forth and flashing his area in a pair of the same tight briefs (standard Starfleet issue, apparently). At this point my wife and I, already weeping from laughter, looked at each other wonderingly and said "Where the heck are they going with this?"
And to think I used to laugh about how in Star Trek: Voyager they would never pass up a chance to wedge two female crewmembers together in a Jefferies Tube. Who knows what awaits us with this new series? "Our only chance to escape this alien prison is to slather hot oil over Ensign Sato's naked body and squeeze her through the bars!"