‘SEAL Team’: AJ Buckley Reveals There’s a ‘Release Version’ for Sonny in the Finale After Losing Clay

SEAL Team tore our hearts out with “Assessing the Damage,” but no one was more devastated by Clay’s (Max Thieriot) death than Sonny (AJ Buckley, who not only gave the best performance of the episode but one of his best performances of the series).

Bravo was in a good mood, feeling like they were one step closer to home, when Jason (David Boreanaz) got the call that Clay was dead. Of course, Sonny wanted to come home immediately. In fact, Bravo was ready to retreat after losing a brother — only they couldn’t. They were the only team that could handle a time-sensitive operation.

Buckley talks about Sonny’s handling of Clay’s death, including a pivotal moment coming up in the finale, and more.

On finding out about Clay’s death.

AJ Buckley: When I first found out in real life, Max told me. We had a feeling that something was going to happen, we just didn’t know how it was going to go. But it was devastating in a lot of ways because Max and I are really good friends. We’ve become really close friends over the course of five years of working together, our kids are a few months apart, and our wives are really close. It’s hard to take because when you go to work with your best friend and then they’re not there, it’s heartbreaking.

I felt really bad for [showrunner] Spencer [Hudnut] because he had to find a way in the world to do this to Clay, there’s no easy way to do [it]. And knowing that the fans would react the way they would, it was a tough situation for Spencer to have to navigate. But I think he did a great job, in terms of getting through that difficult time, and for us as actors and the other actors on set, because Max was such a presence on set, there was a lot of real emotion there, certainly losing him.

We see Sonny get angry, we see him break down, and we see him go through quite a few stages of grief. And then Bravo has to focus on the action that’s going on. So, where would you say Sonny is in terms of his grief at the end of the episode? Has he come to terms with it? Has he had time to come to terms with it?

No, I don’t think he comes to terms with it until — and you know what scene in 10 I’m talking about — there’s a scene in 10 that’s actually probably one of the hardest scenes I’ve ever shot, but I’m really proud of it. Spencer and Chris Chulack were really great in discussing the journey that Sonny takes over the next two episodes and how to map out the emotions so that we have the ups and downs of Sonny and staying true to the mission that he can’t go back to and dealing with that and staying focused on the goal and being aware of the brothers that he’s fighting for.

And then in 10, whatever happens in 10 — you’ll understand when you see it — there’s a kind of release that he needs. It’s definitely hard, but like I said, Spencer and Chris Chulack were great in having an open door with me just to ask all these questions, my concerns, this and that, because this is the first time we’ve actually lost someone from the core group and we just wanted to honor that story as best we could.

Sonny has to be worse off because he doesn’t have the full picture of what happened. He blames himself, and maybe getting some answers can help lighten that burden in some way, right?

I think with everything when you’re that far away from home, and there’s all this other stuff going on… we talked about how you come up with these scenarios and Sonny’s guilt for not being there, and then he criticizes Davis [Toni Trucks] for the decisions she made. But at the end of the day, he has to figure out how to get over Clay’s death and accept it, and adapt, and move on, and honor Clay, and take care of his kid, and all that stuff.

Speaking of criticizing Davis, the Sonny-Davis relationship this season is very strained. How does he feel about her now?

He was very angry with her, but when you go through a death or a loss of some kind, your mind tries to make sense of it, and you criticize the people you love because there’s no manual for how to deal with death. People do things in different ways, and I think Sonny is a volatile character, and I feel like he could criticize Davis. I’m sure at some point he’ll have to close his tail and hug Davis.