‘SEAL Team’: David Boreanaz Explains Jason’s ‘Tactical’ Gamble

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[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for SEAL Team Season 7 Episode 1 “Chaos in the Calm” and Episode 2 “Chaos in the Calm Pt. 2.”]

When we think of SEAL Team, we think of action-packed episodes, character-driven storylines, and the effects both have on Bravo. That was seen at the end of Season 6, with first Jason (David Boreanaz) speaking publicly about his TBI, then other SEALs stepping forward as well. And as a result, when Season 7 begins, Bravo isn’t operating. Rather, the members of the team are basically all doing the last things they want to do (resulting in pranks), though Jason’s getting to spend time with his kids and Ray (Neil Brown Jr.) is getting a look at what life is going to be like when he retires in eight weeks.

And when he retires, Ray will be able to focus on helping those the military isn’t; nothing’s been done on the TBI or PTS fronts. Jason then calls out the new commanding officer of DEVGRU, Captain Walch (Dylan Walsh), on just that, and Walch says that Blackburn (Judd Lormand) had a proposal for warfighter brain health waiting on his desk when he started a month ago, but Jason’s “public temper tantrum” hasn’t won him any hearts or minds. But Jason doesn’t want his teammates suffering for his actions; they’ve had the one thing they love to do taken away from them. But consequences matter. And so, Jason offers up his trident if Bravo is put back in the field.

And so when Bravo is brought in for a debrief, Jason asks Blackburn if Walch is taking his deal. Blackburn doesn’t respond, and it’s unclear by the end of the second episode if that deal is in fact in place.

“It’s a gamble, right?” Boreanaz tells TV Insider of Jason’s offer. “It’s a deal breaker. It’s a negotiation tactic move. It’s a business move in a lot of ways. It’s tactical. That’s what I love about that new character that comes into the fray. This season is like that. I think that’s the give and take. Jason sees this corporate [captain], like, ‘Oh, here’s an opportunity that you can do and help people out and are you going to take this deal? And you’re not doing what you’re saying you’re going to do, so what do I have to do to really rattle that cage? I’m willing to do this. I’m putting it on the line.'”

Michael Moriatis / Paramount+

As he points out, Blackburn “knows Jason all too well” but he has “to be Switzerland here” and “manage these two dudes.” Boreanaz even brings up the Summer Olympics for a comparison. “I don’t know if you saw Snoop Dogg doing the play-by-play for the badminton highlights. It was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. That would be Jason Hayes and the other guy [playing] badminton, [going] back and forth. I want this one. I want that. Well, take that, take this, take that, take this, take that. And you see that back, all that personality. So that’s what that was all about.”

Bravo is sent to Sweden to spend a month working with officers there, and joining them is Drew Franklin (Beau Knapp), who has a reputation; he supposedly cheated on a sniper contest and pays the brass to keep him around, and his father’s a senator. Though the team is supposed to be confined to the base in Sweden, they sneak out—and end up getting caught in the middle of a major situation at a mall after a bomb goes off. The SEALs are the ones to tend to the wounded and go inside to stop the shooters. While doing so, Drew saves Jason after the latter’s hand-to-hand fight for his life; Bravo 1’s hands are left bloody and shaking. (It’s quite an intense 20 minutes to start the second episode.)

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But on the way home, Jason learns that command’s not happy they compromised their presence by running into the fire, so it looks like it’s back to shore duty. He admits to Ray that the guy had him dead to rights before Drew intervened, but Ray’s sure that he’ll be able to shake it off like he has in the past. Jason, however, doesn’t seem so sure. Later at home, he wakes from a nightmare but tells Mandy (Jessica Paré) he’s good.

But at the end of the second episode, he admits to Mandy that he got too comfortable on the sidelines and apologizes for lying and putting up his walls again. But this conversation proves he’s no longer that guy, she points out. With all the work he’s done on himself, the TBI treatments, focusing on her and the kids, he’s found a balance and he likes that, but he’s worried that running back into the fire is going to destroy the progress he’s made. She doesn’t think that with all the work he’s done, the pendulum is just going to swing back. But is she right?

SEAL Team, Sundays, Paramount+