As much as I enjoy Pegg, he's still just an actor.
Who cares what he thinks?
He's an actor and a writer. Remember, he co-written
Shaun of the Dead,
Run Fatboy Run,
Paul and
The Worlds End, the last two listed being sci-fi comedies (with the very last one appearing much more serious in several spots than the one previous to that), as well as co-written all 14 episodes of
Spaced.
So, from a writer's point of view, I have to agree with him. It's not just the sci-fi genre that's suffering, it's ALL genres that are suffering the same degrading. Sci-fi films when they first started were mostly B-grade quick buck grabbers while sci-fi literature was where there was thought provoking material most of the time. And then
2001: A Space Odyssey came along and had the thought provoking along with spectacular visuals. Nowadays, there's not much of the emotional enduring and though provoking in sci-fi in film these days. The last sci-fi movie, to me, that seemed like that was
Sunshine, which got a lot of love and hate from audiences.
But most importantly, the real point is being missed:
Films used to be about challenging, emotional journeys or moral questions that might make you walk away and re-evaluate how you felt about … whatever.
Now we’re walking out of the cinema really not thinking about anything, other than the fact that the Hulk just had a fight with a robot.
And that's the point. Hollywood films, as I've said before, have become nothing more than the film equivalent of fast food. Something quickly made, and quickly consumed and then to be forgotten by those who consume it. That's the point of his statement. And, as bad as it sounds, he's right.