I could have gone either way in that scene. We know she won’t be back for IX so when the bridge was destroyed I thought it was going to be the end of her.

I also thought she might stay behind in Derns place to pilot the ship, that scene would have been even more powerful if it were Leai staying behind to make that sacrifice and then take out Snokes ship.

On a side note, why does anyone have to stay behind to pilot these ships? Don’t they have a droid for that or autopilot? Dern staying behind gave us a badass scene but the fact that an actual person has to stay behind to pilot the ship while everyone else escapes is laughable.