I totally expected Carrie to be back in one form or another. Personally I think it’s cool, there’s no need to have real life tragedy influence the story out of pure convenience.
There is a need, and it’s not just convenience. It’s honestly fantastic they’ve found some way to include her, but there’s literally no way they’d be able to do exactly what they wanted with Leia without Carrie alive (beyond recasting, which would have made a lot of people angry).
Lando should have been in this trilogy from the start.
Nah