Los Angeles: Simon Pegg has explained that his comments where he seemed to criticise superhero movies as infantilisation of cinema came off as generalisation.
The actor-writer, known for his roles in "Mission Impossible" and "Star Trek" movies, took to his blog to talk about his comments to Radio Times where he pointed out that before Star Wars, cinema had been about "challenging, emotional or moral journeys" rather than superheroes.
Titled 'Big Mouth Strikes Again', the blog post offers a beautifully-worded view on cinema.
"Put simply, this is the idea that as a society, we are kept in a state of arrested development by dominant forces in order to keep us more pliant.
"We are made passionate about the things that occupied us as children as a means of drawing our attentions away from the things we really should be invested in: inequality, corruption, economic injustice etc," Pegg wrote while also referring to the French philosopher Jean Baudrillard.
The actor said it was human nature to seek comfort when faced with the awfulness of the world "and where else were the majority of us most comfortable than our youth?".
"There was probably more discussion on Twitter about The Force Awakens and the Batman vs Superman trailers than there was about the Nepalese earthquake or the British general election," Pegg pointed out.
The actor said he loved both "Mad Max: Fury Road" and "Ex-Machina", the two differing modern sci-fi films. He also loved the way Christopher Nolan brought out more depth to Batman through his trilogy on the superhero. Pegg is currently writing "Star Trek Beyond", in which he will also reprise his role as engineering chief Scotty.
"The 'dumbing down' comment came off as a huge generalisation... I did not mean that science fiction or fantasy are dumb, far from it. How could I say that? In the words of Han Solo, 'Hey, it's me!'...
"I guess what I meant was, the more spectacle becomes the driving creative priority, the less thoughtful or challenging the films can become," said Pegg, adding the best thing art can do is "make you think, make you re-evaluate the opinions you thought were yours."
The actor said it would be good to ask why one likes something and ended his post with "I am still a nerd and proud."
