WARNING: SPOILERS ahead for Black Doves season 1.
Keira Knightley’s Netflix espionage seriesBlack Dovesfeatures a robust cast of secret agents, undercover spies, and lethal assassins. Created by Joe Barton (The Lazarus Project,Giri/Haji),Black Doveshas opened to outstanding reviews, earning aperfect 100% Rotten Tomatoes critic scoreupon its June 19, 2025 release date. Knightley (Atonement,Pirates of the Caribbean) leadsthe cast ofBlack Dovesalong with Ben Whishaw, who is best known for playing Q in Daniel Craig’s final three James Bond movies.Black Dovesalso features a stellar supporting cast, including Sarah Lancashire’s Reed, Kathryn Hunter’s Lenny, Ella Lily Hyland’s Williams, and Omari Douglas’s Michael.
Black Dovesfollows Knightley’s Helen Webb, the loving and supportive wife of Andrew Buchan’s Wallace Webb, a prominent British politician.Webb is also a secret agent working for the mysterious covert spy organization known as the Black Doves, which Mrs. Reed is the head of. Reed confronts Helen over an affair she was having with a civil servant named Jason (Andrew Koji), who was shockingly shot and killed in a park from long range. Suspecting that Helen could be in hot water with a powerful criminal conspiracy, Reed enlists a trusted triggerman named Sam Young (Whishaw) to help Helen avert threats to her life and family.
14Helen Webb
Black Dove
Helen Webb is the obvious Black Dove protagonist of the series.Helen Webb is introduced as one of the top Black Dove agentswho has one of the biggest responsibilities as the wife of a prominent British politician. Helen Webb was formerly Helen Dawson before she met and married the ideological Conservative minister of state for defense, Wallace Webb. Before she joined the Black Doves, she went by Daisy Bradshaw, although the leader of the Black Doves, Mrs. Reed, suspected that Daisy was not her real name the first time the two characters met. Helen has a mysterious past that involves an estranged step-sister named Bonnie, who is in prison for murdering her father.
13Sam Young
Assassin
Sam is an assassin inBlack Doveswho has a long history with Lenny Liles. Lenny gave Sam the unthinkable first hit on his own father, Frank. When Sam was a boy, he would watch his ominous and towering father closely and listen to his indirect advice about how to be an assassin. His dad used to tell him that he"never pulled a trigger that didn’t make the world a better place", an ideology that Sam also adopted when he initially approached Reed and Lenny to become a hitman himself. Sam used to be an “odd-job” man for Reed before becoming an assassin through Lenny. Sam fled the country after failing to kill Hector Newman, a target who at the time was only a kid.
12Mrs. Reed
Mrs. Reed is a mysterious, high-ranking member of the Black Doves. It’s unclear whether she had any field experience herselfor what exactly her origin story is with the covert organization. She has a sort of maternal relationship with Helen and guides her as Helen tries to grapple with the intense emotions of losing Jason, who she reveals to have been in love with. As Reed explains to Helen when she first offered her the job, the Black Doves acquire sensitive information to sell to the highest bidder. They operate for no particular country and have no bias toward England.
11Lenny Liles
Assassin Wrangler
Lenny Liles is the point of contact for many of the local assassins in London, such as Sam, Williams, and Eleanor. Although she acts like the head of a mob, she appears to be a standalone figure with her own private network of hitmen and hitwomen. Lenny gives Same several chances to redeem himself after failing to kill Hector Newman when he has the chance. She also threatens Sam with Williams and Eleanor, who end up helping Sam and Helen find Kai-Ming. Lenny’s backstory remains a mystery after one season onBlack Dovesbut judging by the amount of flashbacks used in the series, viewers could learn more about her next season.
10Williams
Williams is one of the London-based assassins in Lenny’s network.Funny but lethal, she is hired by Lenny to intimidate Saminto killing Hector Newman before they eventually become work friends who attempt to uncover the Clarks' conspiracy. Williams is relatively young for an assassin but appears to be quite seasoned in combat. Sam nearly kills her when Williams initially attacks Helen in Jason’s apartment in episode 1. Not much else is known about what got Williams into the game of secret agents and assassins.
9Kent
Kent was the female assassin with Williams who fought Helen in Jason’s apartment before she died. Sam saves Helen with a shotgun by killing Kent in a brutal death as Williams runs away. Kent did not have a speaking part in Black Doves and is only in the series for that one scene. There’s no accessible information about her in the series other than she was Williams' partner for a while.
8Eleanor
Eleanor is a London-based assassin who becomes Williams’s second partner after Kent is killed by Sam. She, like Williams, is quite funny in a deadpan sort of way, and the two of them make a good pair. During a gunfight inBlack Doves,as the Clarks try to find Kai-Ming, Eleanor fires a rocket launcher in a memorable scene. She and Kai-Ming go MIA for a while before surfacing for the season 1 finale showdown with Helen, Same, and the Clarks.
7Cole Atwood
CIA Operative
Cole Atwood is a CIA operative who is stationed at the U.S. Embassy in London. He used to hang out with Kai-Ming and Maggie undercover in order to extract information on Chinese Ambassador Chen. The Chinese discover his identity and accuse him of murdering the Ambassador when, as it turns out, it was actually an accident by Trent Clark. Helen gets Cole from the Embassy and nearly hands him over to the Chinese until she and Sam realize that something is up.Cole ends up being proved innocent but his CIA cover is blown. He also learned the truth about Helen being a Black Dove, which could make him a threat in season 2.
6Dani
Dani is a Black Dove who reveals herself to Helen towards the end of season 1. She was introduced as Wallace’s flirty assistant but Helen quickly caught on to her and figured out she was a spy. Although the two secret agents are technically on the same team, Dani and Helen have an epic fight in the jewelry store after Reed determines that Helen has gone rogue. Helen gets the best of Dani and gets her to back off, sparing her life.The two Black Doves could work more cooperatively next season.
5Elmore Fitch
Elmore Fitch is an elite SAS sniper turned assassin who is not associated with Lenny or the Black Doves.He was hired by Trent Clark to kill Jason, Maggie, and a tabloid reporter named Phillip. Maggie had captured the footage of Trent killing Chen and had told Phillip and Jason about it, which is why they also became Fitch’s targets. Fitch tried to kill Helen in her own home but Helen bested him and took his life in her garden shed. Fitch is hardly in the series, so his non-military background and his relationship with the Clarks are not explored.
