Black Doves season 2 review: Netflix's spy hit just got better

Most spy shows get more serious as they go on. Black Doves has gone the other way, and it's better for it.

The second season of Netflix's London spy thriller, all six episodes of which dropped on Nov. 5, is sharper, funnier and more confident than the first. Keira Knightley and Ben Whishaw are on terrific form, and creator Joe Barton has found exactly the right tone: violent, silly and surprisingly moving, sometimes in the same scene. It has a plausibility problem it never quite solves, but you'll be having too much fun to care. Our score: 8 out of 10.

Critics agree. Season two sits at 94% on Rotten Tomatoes and 83 on Metacritic, which counts as universal acclaim and beats the first season's 78.

Knightley is back as Helen Webb, a secret operative for the Black Doves, a shadowy spy-for-hire outfit, and the wife of a politician who has just become prime minister. When her handler, Mrs. Reed (Sarah Lancashire), drags her into stealing a set of files codenamed Wildflower, and then goes missing, Helen starts digging. Meanwhile her old friend Sam (Whishaw), a weary hitman, is pushed into a new contract by a mysterious stranger (Sam Riley). The two end up chasing the same mystery for very different reasons.

New faces include Ambika Mod as a talkative gunslinger named Laila, Kathryn Hunter, and Neve Campbell. Julian Farino directs the first four episodes, Kieron Hawkes the last two, and Barton wrote the lot.

Bond by way of Tarantino

The first season earned Knightley a Golden Globe nomination, and she's even better here. She plays Helen as a woman who does terrible things and still loves her family fiercely, and she makes both halves believable. The Irish Times' Ed Power put it neatly: "This is Knightley's show and she brings a great flustered mum energy to the part."

Whishaw, who won a Gotham award for season one, gives Sam a heavier load this time: a hitman dulled by drink and drugs, whose loneliness finally catches up with him. TheWrap's Liam Mathews called the pair "once again wonderful," and singled out one wordless moment from Lancashire, whose Reed finally gets a backstory, as "one of the finest moments of nonverbal acting of the year."

What really sets this season apart is its sense of humor. Shootouts are played for laughs, with characters chatting casually mid-firefight, and Mod's deadpan Laila steals most of her scenes. The Times' Ben Dowell (4 stars) called it "funny and gruesome, a riot of slapstick and doomy death," and Mathews summed it up as "James (or Jane) Bond by way of Quentin Tarantino."

The question nobody asks

There is one thing the show would rather you didn't think about. Helen is now the prime minister's wife, which makes her one of the most photographed women in the country, and yet she keeps slipping out to steal files and dodge bullets. Mathews called it "an increasing suspension of disbelief issue that the show chooses to not address," and he's right.

Campbell is the other weak spot. She plays a Defense Department official who never quite fits the part, and the season gives her too little to do for her arrival to pay off.

Still, these are small complaints about a show this well made. The production design and costumes are a cut above, and the six episodes move fast. Inverse's Dais Johnston went as far as saying season two "just makes Season 1 better in comparison."

If you've burned through Slow Horses and need another dose of scruffy British spies, this is the obvious next stop. If you loved the first season, you'll love this one more. And if you never got round to it, season one is six episodes too: Inverse reckons you can watch both in a weekend.

Both seasons are streaming on Netflix now. The Financial Times' Rebecca Nicholson (4 stars) called it "one of the most enjoyably daft spy capers of the year," and that's the best way to watch it: don't take it too seriously, and enjoy the ride.