Shane Salerno (born November 27, 1972) is an American screenwriter, producer, and Chief Creative Officer of The Story Factory. His writing credits include the movies Armageddon, Savages, Shaft, and the TV series Hawaii Five-0. He was chosen by director James Cameron to co-write the four sequels to Avatar, set to release in 2022, 2024, 2026 and 2028. He spent ten years writing, producing, financing, and directing the documentary Salinger, and co-writing with David Shields the companion book which became a New York Times bestseller.As a screenwriter, Salerno has collaborated with James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, Michael Mann, William Friedkin, Oliver Stone, Ron Howard, Jan de Bont, and Ridley Scott, He has sold pitches, spec screenplays, fiction and non-fiction books, feature film documentaries, television pilots, television documentaries, and foreign book deals reaching eight figures. All-told, films he has either written, co-written, or done uncredited work on have resulted in six movies premiering at number one at the box office, and have grossed over one-billion dollars (not including the upcoming Avatar sequels).

Salerno is also the founder and Chief Creative Officer of The Story Factory, a production company and literary agency for novelists, which produces films and TV series based on literary properties, including the Golden Globe-nominated Showtime miniseries The Comey Rule in 2020.Surrounding the 2020 Presidential election, Salerno partnered with Don Winslow to champion Democratic candidates and causes and to fight back against Donald Trump and his agenda. Together they launched Don Winslow Films and began creating their own political videos for social media, highlighting the corruption of Trump and his administration. On October 13, 2020, Don Winslow Films released a video critical of Trump prior to his campaign event in Pennsylvania. The video features Bruce Springsteen's song "Streets of Philadelphia" and has been viewed almost 10 million times. According to a January 4, 2021 Los Angeles Times article, Don Winslow Films videos had garnered over 135 million views at that time. As of April 2022, the total is now over 250 million views.