Will There Be a ‘SEAL Team’ Season 6? David Boreanaz on the Future & Move to Paramount+

David Boreanaz in SEAL Team
Q&A
Sonja Flemming/CBS

The good news is that the SEAL Team Season 5 finale is sure to have you talking, given that major cliffhanger. The bad news is that Paramount+ has yet to renew it.

The military drama moved over to the streaming service after four seasons and four episodes on CBS, a transition that has, for the most part, felt seamless. And to cap one of its best seasons yet, one that explored the characters’ home lives and the effects on warfighters (especially with David Boreanaz’s Jason Hayes, who is now facing his TBI), SEAL Team left all of Bravo in some serious danger.

Boreanaz addresses a possible Season 6, looks back on Jason’s journey, shares what he’d want to see next, and more.

The finale was so good and such a great way to finish a fantastic season.

David Boreanaz: Yeah, it was a good season. I think of all the seasons, it may have been probably the toughest season to shoot. And you kinda say to yourself why would that be? I think, even though we had a limited amount of shows that were ordered — we had four episodes on CBS that launched us into this streaming world, [and] for us, [it was] just kind of getting used to that. So it was kind of challenging to feel that out the first four episodes and then transport over and then get our feet settled in and how that’s gonna work. I think we hit it over pretty good.

But the episodes were so intense once we got over. There’s something about network television, where you have the formula and you kind of hit the acts and this and that. Once we got over to the streaming world, I know that we were able to open that up a little bit, and I think that the good thing is that we’ll even tune into it a little bit more as far as, what does that mean? How can these shows be done? So it was challenging on that aspect.

But they were just big episodes and the timing — we shoot our show 10 hours in seven days. I don’t think that you can see any show out there that does that. We’re an efficient group of people and being an executive producer on the show, along with Spencer [Hudnut] and Chris Chulack, it allows us to kind of really dig deep and figure out how we can do these shows — and have a great line producer — but that’s a lot of work in a lot of less time to produce what we did. I’m really proud of that. I look at these shows and they’re big and production value is great, and for what we had, and the cast was phenomenal the season. It was a tough journey, but we made it through.

David Boreanaz as Jason in SEAL Team

CBS

Have you heard anything about a sixth season?

I can’t say. [Laughs] What I could just say is that we’ve done great for Paramount+. You look at the numbers and the streaming, and then we’ve been trending as one of their number one shows for the past few weeks. So we’re doing good for ’em.

That was a heartbreaking journey this entire season for Jason, from his memory exercise with the fridge …

I know, right? That was tough. The episode where we did the ayahuasca, it was a fun episode to do, but it really allowed us to go into some formats of stuff that allowed us to go a little deeper and shed some light in these dark minds of these guys. It was a journey for me and tough to do. And I was proud of it and happy that it came out the way it came out. I keep going back to this show as a remarkable force of showing what is going on in these men and women’s lives, and it’s a shame that us as a country don’t really recognize that as much as they should. I think we might be the only military show on television today.

Parisa Fakhri as Naima, Neil Brown Jr as Ray in SEAL Team

CBS

Then you have what Ray [Neil Brown Jr.] and Naima [Parisa Fakhri] are doing [looking at how to help vets when they’re home], that’s also really important and you’re highlighting that on the show.

Oh, very much so. This is what the show does, it examines that. And we just, as a society for some reason, when s**t hits the fan, we come together, right? When s**t doesn’t hit the fan, I’m not saying that we don’t come together. There are those that are still consistently come together. But it’s just a subject matter that people don’t really like to talk about. Look at what SEAL Team has done production-wise. If you take all of our shows and look at those shows, I would put them up against any movie out there. I would. Production value. Practically done. We do have some special effects, but how we do it real and live and practically is just, you can’t measure it to shows — again, we’re a military show, but I put it right up against any movie really. You put that thing on the IMAX, you’d be blown away. We should do an IMAX movie. [Laughs] That would be so wild. Oh my God.

I think what we earned also obviously is the character love. These people love these characters and where they’re going and it takes time for people to invest in a show and find a show and then watch it, go, wow, that was a crazy ride. These characters are fun to go along with, and I think that’s where we are. I think the recognition of the show, now being on Paramount+, will benefit us even more as far as whatever you’re looking for to be benefited from. For me, it’s just the message and the story and putting that out there for people to see like, this, this is what these guys do, and that’s why you get up and have a cup of coffee in the morning and go in your car and drive and get a smoothie and you’re free, you’re protected, and not too many people will remember that or think about that.

I don’t want to politically grandstand here. I’m just saying that I love the show. I love the season. Yes, it was hard because it was so compact. I was telling Spencer and Chris, geez, man, the mental and the physical exhaustion alone for my character this year was just tenfold. I think it’s because we had less hours to do it and less days to do it in, and it just became so detailed and small in an order size that it became more magnified, if that makes sense. To me it felt that way.

David Boreanaz as Jason in SEAL Team

CBS

You played Angel for about eight years between Buffy and Angel, Booth for 12 years on Bones, and in this finale, when Clay tells him he’s leaving, Jason tells him he’ll still be there when he comes back. After five seasons now, are you thinking about how much longer you’d play Jason?

I don’t know. I think for me, it’s really relative to the stories that we’re telling and I’m excited more so about the switch to Paramount+. I find that that of all the streaming networks, this is a very positive one and they’re very aggressive in the way they do their shows. I still feel like this show moving over there and the potential of going on to another season and whatnot, the show won’t be drastically different, but it will have a slower burn to it. It’ll be more of like what happens in two weeks over a 10-episode order. It’s not just this huge season of — we don’t have to invest so much in certain areas of the storylines, but it may be like, hey, they get up, and this is their day and that’s 10 episodes. It’s very similar to like a 24 kind of aspect, but you really get to really now get under the skin of the characters, see where these men and women are and see how they’re affected from when they wake up to when they go to bed. I think that’s fascinating.

I feel like this season, especially, just showed how many more stories there are to tell for all the characters, like with Davis [Toni Trucks] is expanding into a new world.

Yes. Yeah, she is. It’s phenomenal. When I directed the [penultimate] episode, I really wanted to highlight Davis’ strengths and that character really was originated from a real person that [executive producer] Mark Owen knew. She was just a badass and didn’t take any s**t, and I really wanted to explore that with Toni playing Davis. I think we did a good job and I was happy to see her doing all that physical stuff and stunts and she was pregnant, so it was like, wow. We were very cautious and safe, but she loved it. She had a great time and it was great to see Toni get into that, into those moments.

What are you hoping to explore with Jason going forward?

It’s so interesting. I don’t know how he’s gonna come out of this season. Victory? I don’t know. Injury? It’s gonna be interesting. Born on the Fourth of July move? I’m always excited for his adversities. Whatever Jason has to hit in adversities, regardless to me, is like a great character study. I have to get over this in order to get there. I think that’s Jason’s life, and I’m excited about playing that.