Black Doves episode 1 recap: ‘To Love Then’

The Christmas spy thriller that you’ve been waiting for is finally streaming on Netflix. Created by Joe Barton, Black Doves is one of the best new Netflix shows to watch in December 2024! 

All six episodes of Black Doves were released on Thursday, Dec. 5. At Show Snob, I’ll be recapping each episode and sharing all of the big moments in the first season of this great Netflix original series. 

“To Love Then,” the first episode of Black Doves, begins in a British pub around Christmas. On the TV, there’s a news report about the death of the Chinese Ambassador to the UK. 

Outside, Jason (Andrew Koji) walks through the streets of London. He says calls two people, Maggie and Philip, on the phone to tell them he thinks he’s being followed. While on the phone with them, they are murdered by unknown assassins. 

Jason sits down on a bench and makes one more phone call, one he says he shouldn’t make, but he says he wants to tell her something. He doesn’t get the words out before he’s shot in the chest and dies. 

Next, we meet Sam (Ben Whishaw), an assassin who is summoned back to the UK for a new job. 

Then, there’s a shift in tone and we meet the Webb family. Helen (Keira Knightley) is the wife of Wallace (Andrew Buchan), the British Minister of Defense, and their two children. Wallace lets slip that the Chinese Ambassador to the UK died of an overdose while his daughter remains missing. 

The family hustles out of the house to a charity event, hosted by Helen. After giving a short speech, Helen speaks with a mysterious woman, Reed (Sarah Lancashire). She’s one of the higher-ups with the Black Doves, and she informs Helen that Jason Davies, Helen’s lover, was killed the night before. He’s the man from the bench. 

Helen reveals that she’d been having an affair with Jason for three months because she was in love with him. Reed informs her that Jason, Maggie, and Philip were killed and their deaths are connected. Then, Reed quizzed Helen about who Jason was, what he was up to, how much Helen gave up, etc. Helen gets very defensive, obviously. Reed tells her to lay low. 

From the conversation, we can conclude that Helen is a spy, part of the Black Doves. It appears Helen was not happy in her life and marriage, and she was planning to leave this life behind for her new relationship with Jason, who is not a spy. Now, Helen is in some deep trouble with the Black Doves, but she’s also maybe connected to three people who were mysteriously killed. Even the Black Doves don’t know why they were killed, or that’s what Reed tells Helen anyway. 

Then, Reed meets with Sam, a person with a history with Helen. Reed wants Sam to make sure that no one is going to kill Helen, who is very connected within the British government. She’s too deep to be extracted. Sam is meant to watch out for her and her family. 

Sam drinks at the hotel bar and hooks up with a stranger. 

At the Webb house, Wallace tells Helen that the Chinese believe the Ambassador was murdered. They don’t believe it was an overdose. So, he’s forced to go to work. Helen uses the opportunity to sneak out, but first, she opens the Christmas gift from Jason. It’s just a necklace or a bracelet, no secret messages included. 

Helen pays a visit to Jason’s apartment. The landlord opens the door as Helen searches the apartment for something. She listens to Jason’s final voicemail to her, the one he made as he was killed. She has some flashbacks to their relationship as she goes through his things.

After hitting his vape, Helen notices the vapor flows to a picture. Very interesting. 

While Helen is there, two police officers arrive at the landlord’s house. When they find out that a woman is upstairs in Jason’s flat, they kill the landlord. Oh, they’re actually assassins, too! Helen hears it all happen and sends a text to Sam that she’s been compromised with her location. 

Helen fights off the assassins before Sam arrives and kills one of them with a shotgun, covering Helen in blood. They flee, but Helen steals a box from a safe in Jason’s apartment as they leave, just before the police arrive. 

After they leave, Helen and Sam catch up. It’s been several years since they saw each other last. Sam left London in a hurry, but now, he’s back. Helen asks Sam for two things: to keep her alive long enough to take her revenge on whoever killed Jason and to keep her family safe. Sam says that he “will endeavor to try.” 

That night, Helen goes through the hard drive from Jason’s apartment. She relives all the memories with him as she reads through their texts together. It sure looks like they were for real in love. 

Helen also finds that Jason called someone a bunch of times before he was killed. She also finds a text from Philip that suggests there is “footage” of something from “Sy.”

Meanwhile, Sam goes to pick up some weaponry in town. He’s trying to figure out who killed Jason and why, but he bumps into an old friend who invites him to dinner. He visits the location of where the sniper fired from to kill Jason. There, he finds a bullet casing on the balcony of what appears to be an apartment or office building. He drops it off at another person within the Black Doves to run it for prints, which come back quickly. It seems like Sam is pretty good at his job. 

At dinner, we learn that Sam had a relationship with someone named Michael. Sam left in a hurry without a word. Not great, Sam. But, it’s clear that something happened with Sam’s work. Michael has a new partner and a child, which upsets Sam but he tries to hide it. 

Later, Helen meets with Reed in a theater. She tries to convince Helen to let Sam handle things and lay low, but that’s not Helen’s style. She 

Sam finds out that someone called Elmore Fitch is the person who killed Jason and leaves dinner. He gets an address, and Helen meets him out front, but he has one more huge revelation. Jason was calling Kai-Ming Chen, the daughter of the Chinese Ambassador who is now missing according to the news reports. What was Jason doing? Was he a spy as well? Helen needs to know. 

That’s where Black Doves episode 1 ends! Helen is packing up to get her revenge on this Elmore Fitch person who killed her lover, Jason. Again, this is the opposite of “lay low,” which was what Reed told her to do. I’m sure it’s going to work out great for Helen in Black Doves episode 2.