A new star-studded series has dropped on Netflix – and it’s already tipped as a must-watch by our critic.
That’s right, we’re talking about Black Doves. The six-part espionage series follows polite politician’s wife Helen, played by Keira Knightley, who embarks on a passionate affair – with somebody who has no idea that she’s actually a spy. And when she winds up dead, she calls on her old friend Sam (Ben Whishaw), a fellow gun for hire, for help.
The series was created by Joe Barton, who used real-life events for inspiration – including the recent British spy cops scandal.
Here’s all the details on Black Doves and the real-life controversy that inspired the show.
What is the plot of Black Doves?
Set in London at Christmas, we meet Helen (Knightley) who, upon first glance, seems a normal loving housewife and mother. She is married to MP Wallace Webb, played by Andrew Buchan, and the pair seemingly live the perfect life.
But things take a turn when we find out Helen is actually a member of the Black Doves, a super spy organisation, and living a double life. For ten years, she’s been passing on her politician husband’s secrets to the group. Helen then embarks on a passionate affair with a man who has no idea what her secret identity is. They both get caught in the crossfire when her lover falls victim to the dangerous London underworld and is assassinated.
Helen’s old friends (aka Whishaw) are called in to help her investigate the death and keep her safe.
Who stars in Black Doves?
There is a stellar cast in the series. As well as Knightley and Broadchurch’s Andrew Buchan, Sarah Lancashire stars as Reed the spymaster.
Ben Whishaw, known best for being the voice of Paddington, plays Sam Young, a hired assassin who also happens to be Helen’s close friend who is called in to help her.
Which real-life events inspired the Netflix show?
The show was written by director Barton last Christmas and he was inspired by a real life scandal which hit first headlines and stunned Britain in 2010.
He said in an interview with the Radio Times: “I had been reading as well about those spy cops, those guys, and they infiltrated that environmental group and had ended up having children with them. I mean, a really horrific story, much darker than this.
“But I was like, OK, that idea, that duplicitousness of having a pretend marriage lasting years and years and years and then it's disappeared. That was really part of, I think, the inspiration for it as well.”
The so-called spy cops were a top-secret unit of the Metropolitan Police who had spent decades living double lives – even having children with people who had no idea they were undercover police officers.
There was a public inquiry examining the conduct of these undercover police officers who spied on more than 1,000 political groups between 1968 and at least 2010. At least 139 undercover officers in deployments typically lasting four years were sent to infiltrate mainly left-wing and progressive groups.
What happened to the people involved?
At least four of the undercover officers are known or alleged to have fathered children with women they met during their deployments.
The undercover officers joined political groups and pretended to be activists but they were there to collect information about the campaigners and their protests and send secret reports back to police bosses.
The inquiry, which has so far cost £64m, is still ongoing because of the number of people involved and the number of years being looked at. It is not expected to end before 2026.
Campaign group Police Spies Out Of Lives regularly share stories of people embroiled in these deployments, who said being in relationships with people who were lying the whole time has made them “question their sanity” and made them “paranoid’ in every-day life.
