Netflix’s Acclaimed Spy Series Now Streaming Season 2 Turns Q Into James Bond

The long-anticipated second season of Netflix’s spy thriller series Black Doves has arrived to fill the void left by Slow Horses. Black Doves feels like the Winter Olympics version of Slow Horses: it has the same blend of high-octane action spectacle and witty British banter, but with a classically Shane Black Christmas setting. Like Slow Horses, Black Doves subverts the usual James Bond formula with a gritty sense of realism and a dry sense of humor.

Keira Knightley is technically the lead of the series as Helen Webb, née Dawson, a secret agent who marries a politician she honeytrapped and gets drawn into a sinister conspiracy when her extramarital lover is killed. Knightley gives a terrific performance, and Helen is a compelling antihero in her own right, but her co-star Ben Whishaw steals the show. Helen is interesting enough to follow her story, but her colleague Sam Young is outright fascinating.

Sam is a friend of Helen’s who used to be a hitman and now springs into action whenever his old pal calls. Whishaw was the perfect meta casting for this role because, apart from Paddington Bear, his most iconic role is James Bond’s tech guy, Q, from the Daniel Craig era, and now, he’s essentially playing Bond himself. Much like Bond, Sam is a cold-blooded assassin with a license to kill. He’s as charming in bed as he is ruthless in the field, and he maintains a sardonic smirk through all his violent actions.

Just as Slow Horses has given us a chance to see Gary Oldman as an aging 007 archetype who’s still got it, Black Doves has given us a chance to see what Whishaw’s Bond would look like. Sam is both believably badass and surprisingly vulnerable, and Whishaw has made the most of that promotion out of the Q Branch.

Black Doves’ Sam Young Is The Closest We’ve Come To A Gay James Bond

The casting search is currently underway for the next actor to play Bond. Jack Lowden, Callum Turner, Josh O’Connor, Robert Pattinson, and Nicholas Hoult are all reportedly under consideration to play 007 in Amazon’s upcoming reboot directed by Denis Villeneuve, and there’s at least one unannounced mystery actor who could still land the job.

There’s been a lot of discussion about whether to diversify the casting of 007, and whether Bond could be a woman or a person of color or a member of the LGBTQ+ community. The producers are unlikely to cast anyone other than a straight white man to play Bond — those five announced candidates all fit the traditional bill — so it’s up to other Bond-inspired media to imagine the other versions of the character we could have. Idris Elba’s turn as Luther is pretty close to what his 007 would look like, and Knightley’s portrayal of Helen in Black Doves is essentially a female Bond.

Black Doves has not only given us a female Bond; Whishaw’s Sam is the closest we’ve seen to a gay Bond. Sam has all the hallmarks of Bond: he’s a suave, charismatic killer-for-hire who rarely loses his cool, never misses a shot, and likes to sleep around. The only difference is that, instead of sleeping with women, he sleeps with men.

It’s refreshing to see a gay character whose main internal conflict has nothing to do with being gay. Throughout Black Doves, Sam is tormented by his grisly work and his flimsy code of ethics and the targets he’s forced to eliminate and the fact that he can never settle down with someone he loves and enjoy a nice, peaceful, normal life, but he’s completely at peace with being gay. That’s not what defines him; that’s just part of who he is, and that’s what good representation looks like.

Black Doves

Release Date

December 5, 2024

Network

Netflix

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