Alan Zelenetz

Alan Zelenetz is an American film producer and comic-book writer best known for co-creating the series Alien Legion for the Marvel Comics imprint Epic Comics and a founder of Ovie Entertainment. Zelenetz also wrote several issues of Marvel's Moon Knight series, several issues of Thor and a run of Conan the King (issues #16–28). Before becoming a film producer, Zelenetz was a junior high school principal at the Yeshiva of Flatbush, an Orthodox Jewish school in Brooklyn, and Solomon Schechter High School of New York. One of the science teachers under his supervision was the father of Darren Aronofsky, director of Pi (1998) and Requiem for a Dream (2000).

Zelenetz quit his job as a high school principal and worked his way into a paid position at Marvel Comics. He did some volunteer proofreading work for a while, and then started to write for Thor, Conan the Barbarian, and Moon Knight. For Moon Knight, he introduced the Jewish identity of the character to the storyline. In Thor Annual #10 (1982), Zelenetz introduced the first Nigerian hero, Shango (recruited by Thor to confront Demogorge), in the history of Marvel.

Zelenetz was the main author and researcher for Marvel's Official Handbook of the Conan Universe, a guide to the Hyborian Age, the fictional setting of the Conan the Barbarian stories.

He is also director of ICI, the Institute for Curricular Initiatives in New York City.