I personally felt that Return of the Jedi ended on a pacifism note. He threw away his lightsaber and put his hope in the hearts of his enemies. The end.
I never read the comics or the ensuing expanded universe. As far as I knew, Luke went on to be a pacifist leader for the new republic and never touched a lightsaber again.
To imagine a sequel where he is a "badass" and wipes out Star Destroyers with a flick of his wrist would miss the point, in my opinion. Sure, it LOOKS like he's fighting for the good, but it's on the path to the dark side.
The prequels reinforced this whole concept to me. Jedis talked into shifting from defenders to military generals were misdirected on to the path toward the dark side. I personally feel that this is the subtext to Mace Windu's purple lightsaber and his "He's too dangerous to be left alive" line. (It's also the brilliant part of the TLJ Pratorean Guard fight. Rey & Kylo, so close, so hard to detect where the line is... More of an Obi-Wan vs. Maul fight than a Qui-Gon vs. Maul fight. Rey & Kylo stand back to back like the positive and negative poles of a magnet.)
Then along comes a new set of films where it is said that Luke trained new jedi. Uh oh - I hope he didn't bring his lightsaber... Or at least, I hope he's keeping his eye on the 'defense, not attack' ball.
Rey presents Luke with his old lightsaber. What does he do? He throws it away OF COURSE.
Then we hear the tale of "What would you do if you went back in time and found sleeping young Hitler and you had a gun next to you." Would you take a moment to think about preventing the Holocaust and World War II? Would you think about it at least enough to pick up the gun? You've proven yourself a pacifist when it was about saving your father's soul and preventing your sister's corruption, but what about preventing the deaths of billions?
Luke considers it... and dang it, he falls into the same old trap humanity always falls into.
Ben might not have fallen at all if Luke would have given him a chance to choose for himself. But Luke pushed first, so Ben pushed back, and thus Luke created Kylo Ren.
No wonder Luke feels so ashamed. No wonder he cuts himself off of the force. No wonder he's cynical when Rey shows up. No wonder that his "Jedi lessons" are more 'anti-Jedi' training.
Ultimately, though, he realizes he can't hide from the war. But he faces Kylo on his terms. Without doing any real harm to Ben.
With peace and purpose.
