Felix Hughes (Steve Pemberton) books into room 9 to find out if his wife Brenda is cheating on him with the help of a lip reader Iris (Sian Clifford).
Tropes:
- Almost Kiss: The hotel manager knocks on the door while Felix and Iris are about to share a kiss.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Iris and her team successfully assassinate Dimitri and pin it on Felix.
- Boom, Headshot!: Felix is taken out with a shot to the forehead.
- Brick Joke: Felix using his pencils to move the dirty tissue only to lick his pencil later, causing him to do a Double Take as he remembers where exactly they've been.
- Catfishing: Iris pretends to be "Tired Terry" on a dads' website, apparently so she can get closer to Felix and invent a reason for him to need her services. In reality, she was encouraging him to 'get closure' with Brenda so she could frame him at the hotel for Dimitri's murder.
- Chekhov's Gag: The Porn Stash that Felix tries to hide from Muller that has not been cleaned up from the last visitor, and the Running Gag about Muller receiving complaints from Felix's next-door neighbor. Both are setups on Iris and her team's part to suggest that Felix is unstable and was obsessing over Brenda alone.
- Chekhov's Gun: We see the hairdryer when Felix goes through the bedside drawer early on.
- Closet Shuffle: Iris has to hide from the nosy hotel manager twice. Felix suggests the wardrobe but she favors the bathroom.
- Deceased Fall-Guy Gambit: Enforced. Iris throws a hairdryer at Felix in the panic of Dimitri's shooting, which the SWAT team mistakes for a gun.
- Double-Meaning Title: Iris is providing "lip service" for Felix - she's reading Brenda's lips for him. She's also providing "lip service" for whatever conspiracy wanted Dimitri dead, by kissing Felix and pretending to be in love with him.
- Foreshadowing:
- Felix mentions how crazy the single dads on Dads Net are (perhaps in a Take That! to Fathers For Justice)...and that's exactly how he appears by the end of the story.
- Also the "gentleman next door" complaining to management about the noise Felix is making. It's all a ploy to make Felix seem unstable.
- Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Played with. Müller, the hotel manager, spends 90% of his screen time being as suspicious as possible but it ultimately turns out he has nothing to do with the Government Conspiracy, he's just irritating.
- The Ghost: Neither Brenda nor Dimitri are seen or heard, with Iris doing their voices or transcribing them for Felix.
- Government Conspiracy: It's never made clear what Dimitri is going to announce before his death or why they wanted to stop him, but Iris clearly works for a high-powered politician.
- Hidden Wire: Turns out Iris was in communication with her team via a hidden wire all along.
- Honey Trap: A roundabout version with Iris. She uses Brenda as a honeytrap, convincing Felix to go to her so she can frame him for murder, then she does a more conventional version when she pretends to be in love with him in order to distract him long enough for Dimitri to get shot.
- I Never Told You My Name: Felix gets suspicious of Iris after he notices that she referred to the hotel manager by name though she should have no way of knowing it — she says she's never been there before, and she snuck in without meeting him.
- In Love with the Mark: Subverted. Iris pretends to be this with Felix after convincing him that she was spying on him because of Brenda's work but fell in love with him anyway.
- Karma Houdini: Iris and her co-conspirators pull off their plan without anyone even knowing they were there.
- Lonely Piano Piece: A somber piano can be heard on the soundtrack, underpinning Felix's loneliness.
- Love Makes You Crazy: Felix mentions to Iris how love has a habit of making you mad.
- Meaningful Name: Iris watches through the window to read lips. (Except it seems almost certain that's not her real name.)
- Mistaken for Cheating: Zigzagged. This is clearly the setup of the episode, although it's never answered whether or not Brenda is sleeping with Dimitri, because she and Felix weren't together in the end.
- Mistaken for Prostitute: Muller is convinced that Felix has a prostitute in his room, and he is alone with a single woman, Iris, but not for sex. At least not at first. (Then it turns out to be a setup anyway.)
- Murder the Hypotenuse: The motive for Dimitri's staged murder by Felix, really a politically motivated hit.
- Never a Self-Made Woman: Brenda is only relevant as far as she works for Dimitri, and Iris appears to work for the male politician too.
- No-Tell Motel: Felix finds himself in a run-down hotel room with leftovers of previous sexual encounters. Muller is very determined not to have that kind of reputation but seems to be fighting a losing battle.
- Obligatory Earpiece Touch: An interesting variation when Iris lifts the microphone hidden under her blouse to her mouth to call for the hit on Felix. It's at this point that we realize she was wired up and part of a bigger operation.
- Pretty Little Headshots: Felix's fate.
- Psycho Ex-Boyfriend: Felix is obsessed with Brenda, stalking her, and has had a restraining order issued, but isn't actually violent... but it takes very little for Iris' organisation to set him up to look that way as a cover for their assassination of Dimitri.
- Reading Lips: Iris isn't deaf, but she can read lips — she makes some mistakes, like "Max" for "my ex", but other than that, she's pretty much spot on.
- Repeating So the Audience Can Hear: When Felix is talking to his ex-wife Brenda on the phone, Iris voices out Brenda's part by reading her lips from across the street. Lampshaded by Felix when he tells Iris to stop doing that.
- Stalker without a Crush: This seems to be Iris's actual function once it reveals that she was almost certainly faking her Stalker with a Crush attraction to Felix in order to frame him for murder.
- Tantrum Throwing: Felix throws the binoculars across the room after his wife informed him of the restraining order.
- Wham Line: "Now." Spoken by Iris in her normal voice, and not her thick Cockney accent she'd been putting on.
- Wham Shot: The shot of Iris talking to her cuff.
- Zipping Up the Bodybag: Happens to Felix in the last scene.
