What does Patrick’s final warning mean? Black Doves season 2 ending and Kestrel explained

*Warning: Spoilers ahead for Black Doves season 2*

There are a lot of moving parts in Black Doves season 2, so you’d be forgiven for needing a breakdown of the shadowy organisation known as Kestrel. Given Patrick’s final warning to Helen, it’s something that will no doubt cause more trouble down the line.

The second season of Netflix’s hit spy thriller sees Helen (Keira Knightley) and Sam (Ben Whishaw) caught up in a conspiracy involving Black Doves boss Reed (Sarah Lancashire).

Things are a lot harder for them this time round, what with Helen’s husband Wallace (Andrew Buchan) now prime minister. No biggie. As for Sam, he’s forced to carry out a series of jobs for Kestrel, only to discover all of his hits are former Black Doves.

And all of them were involved in Wildflower, a secret operation from Reed’s past that Kestrel is determined to make her pay for. Although the explosive season 2 finale sees Kestrel’s plans unravel, one particularly dangerous enemy manages to slip through the cracks.

Oh yes, we’re talking about Patrick (Sam Riley), who makes an ominous final appearance that will no doubt spell (even more) trouble for Helen.

What does Patrick’s final warning mean at the end of Black Doves season 2?

After Helen says goodbye to Sam, who’s leaving for Italy (for the time being), she bumps into Patrick. She doesn’t know who he is, and he gives her a card – it’s only when she looks at it that she realises he’s no random stranger.

The card is blank aside from an outline of a bird on it. And that bird is a kestrel. Patrick isn’t necessarily announcing a specific new attack. The card is simply a reminder that while Kestrel failed to fully take down the Black Doves, it still exists and can reach Helen whenever it chooses.

When Helen presents the card to Reed right at the end of Black Doves season 2, Reed says, “Vita is dead, Kestrel are not, and they want us to know that. We shall have to be vigilant.”

There’s something rather fitting about the organisation’s name too. A kestrel is a small bird of prey, known for its hunting technique: hovering in place while watching for movement below before swooping down on its prey.

Doves are traditionally associated with peace. It’s quite an apt comparison. In the context of Patrick handing Helen a Kestrel calling card, the bird could represent a hunter marking its prey.

But the Black Doves are already on the case. Reed hands Helen a file containing photos and information of Patrick heading to Tokyo. Not only does this once again emphasise that Kestrel is still going, but it could also suggest the organisation has a much wider international reach than anyone previously realised.

Whether Patrick is heading there to regroup or has something else planned remains to be seen. Either way, it seems Helen hasn’t seen the last of him.

What exactly is Kestrel?

Kestrel is a shadowy organisation that started out as a radical anarchist political group in East Berlin. But it later became a dangerous enemy of the Black Doves, as we see in season 2.

To understand why Kestrel wants Reed dead, we have to go all the way back to 1988. Back then, Reed was working undercover under the codename Wildflower, having infiltrated the group on behalf of the Black Doves.

During the operation, she had a relationship with Kestrel leader Franz Meyer, and the pair had a daughter named Vita. But Reed was also having an affair with Peter Maddison, the Black Doves’ station chief in Berlin. After five years on the job, she wanted to leave her undercover life behind to be with him.

There was just one problem: Peter didn’t want to end the operation. So Reed fabricated intelligence suggesting Kestrel was planning a car bombing, hoping it would give the Black Doves a reason to shut the group down.

Unfortunately, her plan worked a little too well. The Black Doves began wiping out the entire Kestrel cell. As his peers were being killed, Reed revealed her true identity to Franz and tried to convince him to leave with Vita.

But after finding out the truth, Peter turned up and killed Franz. He then attempted to kill Reed, forcing her to shoot him.

Reed managed to escape the bloodshed, but Vita disappeared in the chaos. Rather than admit what had happened, Reed told her colleagues that her daughter had died too.

And here’s where things get even messier. Vita grew up in a Soviet orphanage, believing her mother had abandoned her. Understandably, she wasn’t best pleased about that.

Fast forward to the present day, and Vita has resurfaced under a completely different identity: Katia Chernov (Sylvia Hoeks), the wife of Russian oligarch Alexi Chernov (Goran Kostic). Yep, the very same Katia we’ve been watching throughout season 2.

As it turns out, she’s the mastermind behind Kestrel’s entire revenge plot, with Patrick helping her carry it out. The pair use compromising footage of Helen to blackmail Sam into killing people connected to the Wildflower operation. Finally, they force him to hand Reed over to them.

But getting revenge on Reed isn’t enough. Vita wants to destroy the Black Doves altogether, and her plan culminates in a deadly assault on the organisation’s headquarters.

Meanwhile, Helen is ordered to assassinate Wallace, with her children being used as leverage. The idea is that having the prime minister murdered by his own wife would expose Helen’s secret life and bring the entire Black Doves organisation crashing down.

Thankfully, Helen manages to save Wallace and her children, while Vita’s attack on headquarters ends in disaster. She is fatally wounded during the gunfight and dies after one final encounter with Reed, who tells her she never stopped loving her.

So, while Vita was the driving force behind the conspiracy, her death doesn’t mean Kestrel has been wiped out. As we’ve already seen, Patrick is still very much alive – and there’s no telling how many others might be working alongside him.

Will Patrick and Kestrel return in Black Doves season 3?

There’s no official confirmation of Black Doves season 3 just yet, but a writers’ room is open. And if the Netflix show does return, it certainly sounds like we haven’t seen the last of Patrick and Kestrel.

Speaking to Netflix’s Tudum about the season 2 ending, creator Joe Barton explained, “We wanted to keep the idea of that group alive and Kestrel as the SPECTRE to their James Bond.”

For those unfamiliar, SPECTRE is the shadowy criminal organisation that has caused James Bond all sorts of trouble over the years. So, it sounds like Barton has deliberately left the door open for Kestrel to become an ongoing enemy of the Black Doves.

And Patrick could prove a particularly dangerous opponent for Helen. In the same interview, Keira Knightley said, “He’s quite a good psychotic killer. That’s quite a good matchup for [Helen].”

Of course, Kestrel has taken quite a hit, but the same goes for the Black Doves. In other words, Reed and Robert Conteh (Babou Ceesay) have some serious rebuilding to do.

“It’s fun to imagine how that organisation might reinvent itself,” Barton added. “In the first season, it’s a capitalist organisation instead of an ideological one. What does that mean in today’s world, and how can they continue to ply their trade without being too evil?”

Helen’s role will undoubtedly change too, with Barton explaining, “She can’t be the spy wife anymore, but she’s still a super capable agent.”

Nothing’s set in stone just yet. But if Black Doves season 3 goes ahead, we’d be surprised if that card is the last we hear from Patrick.

And it’s sounding hopeful right now. Speaking on the Pilot TV podcast this month about a potential third chapter, Barton said, “Netflix are really behind it… We have a writers’ room for it. They’ve been really supportive. I think everyone’s at the whims of market forces… So we hope so.”

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Featured image credit: Netflix