Cornell has also written for a number of British comics, as well asMarvel Comics andDC Comics in the United States, and has had six original novels published.
He is one of only two people to be nominated forHugo Awards in prose, comics and TV.[2]
Cornell's professional writing career began in 1990 when he was a winner in a young writers' competition and his entry,Kingdom Come, was produced and screened onBBC Two. Soon after, he wroteTimewyrm: Revelation, a novel for theVirgin New Adventures series ofDoctor Who novels.Timewyrm: Revelation was a reworking of a serialisedfan fiction piece Cornell had penned previously for thefanzineQueen Bat. Several otherDoctor Who novels followed, includingHuman Nature.[3]
Cornell then began working forGranada Television, where he wrote for the children's medical dramaChildren's Ward and created his own children's seriesWavelength forYorkshire Television, which ran for two series. He made the crossover to working in adult television full-time in 1996, when he was one of the main contributors to Granada's supernatural soap operaSpringhill, which ran for two years onSky One and later onChannel 4.
After a short stint onCoronation Street, he began working for other production companies, including contributing an episode in 1999 toRed Production Company's anthology drama seriesLove in the 21st Century for Channel 4. His episode, entitledMasturbation, starredIoan Gruffudd as Jack. He was due to be one of the writers on Red Production Company's plannedQueer as Folk spin-off seriesMisfits, but the series was never made, being cancelled by Channel 4.[4]
In the 21st century he has written mainly for theBBC, contributing episodes to all three of their regular medical dramas:Casualty,Holby City and the daytime soap operaDoctors. He also contributed to the 1950s-set Sunday evening prime time drama seriesBorn and Bred and was one of the writers of the 2005 series revival ofDoctor Who, writing the episode "Father's Day". The episode was nominated for theHugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form in 2006 and came third in terms of votes for its category. Cornell later wrote a two-part story forDoctor Who's 2007 series, based on his 1995Virgin New Adventures novelHuman Nature. The title of the first episode was also "Human Nature", while the second was titled "The Family of Blood".[5] In 2008, the two episodes were nominated for theHugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form.[6]
In February 2006, Cornell announced in a post on his weblog[7] that he would be writing an episode for the BBC'sRobin Hood, produced byTiger Aspect Productions for the same Saturday evening family slot asDoctor Who. He later announced that he was also writing a secondRobin Hood episode for later in the first series. His first episode, "Who Shot the Sheriff?", aired on BBC One on 21 October 2006. His second, "A Thing or Two About Loyalty", followed on 2 December 2006. He also wrote an episode for the second season of another Saturday evening family adventure programme, the ITV science-fiction seriesPrimeval, transmitted in February 2008.[8]
He also wrote the one-off pilotPulse, which was shown onBBC Three in early June 2010.[9]
Outside of television, he has been active in various other media, having written sixDoctor Who novels forVirgin Publishing andBBC Books during the 1990s, threeDoctor Who audio dramas for Big Finish Productions and a fully animated internet-broadcastDoctor Who adventure,Scream of the Shalka (starringRichard E. Grant as the Doctor) forbbc.co.uk in 2003. He has also written two mainstream science-fiction novels,Something More andBritish Summertime forGollancz, and various novels, short stories and audio dramas based around a character he created for theNew Adventures, ProfessorBernice Summerfield, and whom he later licensed to Big Finish Productions.[citation needed]
Cornell has also writtenYoung Avengers Presents No. 4 (April 2008)[14] and aFantastic Four mini-series comic,True Story, which started in July 2008, which featured the team encountering characters from the pages of literary classics.[15][16] In 2008, he wrote a comic which featured on the Doctor Who website.[17] He has also written theYoung Avengers limited series that ties intoDark Reign[18][19] andBlack Widow: Deadly Origin a mini-series that ties into the character's appearance inIron Man 2.[20]
Cornell became the nextAction Comics writer afterWar of the Supermen.[21] Cornell signed with DC Comics exclusively in 2010 as part of writing forAction Comics.[22] His 16-issue run on the series included number 900. In late 2010 and early 2011, Cornell completed nine issues set in Batman's world:Knight & Squire, a six-issue miniseries, and a three-issue run inBatman & Robin, #17–19.
Cornell is part of the regular panel of the podcastSF Squeecast, which won the 2012 and 2013 Hugo Award for best fancast.[29]
In January 2016, Cornell announced his return to television drama work with his first script for US television, contributing an episode to theCBSSherlock Holmes seriesElementary.[30]
In 2018, he started co-hosting (with Lizbeth Myles from theVerity! podcast) a podcast reviewing horror films made byHammer Film Productions entitled Hammer House of Podcast.[31]
In an interview on theDoctor Who: DWO Whocast, Cornell stated that this entry in Wikipedia described him as "both a Christian and apagan", which he has chosen not to correct as it illustrates his sympathies for thepagan world. He then goes on to state that he is anAnglican but is very "Low Church, almost aCalvinist" and this is partly because he doesn't enjoyhymns.[32]
Spiritual themes are common in his work (for example, his novelSomething More). Other frequent references in his work includeowls.[33]
Cornell is married to Caroline Symcox, currently the Vicar ofSt Mary's Church, Fairford,[34] who also has writtenDoctor Who-based audio plays forBig Finish Productions on her own and with Cornell. In 2021 Cornell stated that he and Symcox had a son, then ten years old.[35]
Hell Comes To Birmingham (collectsCaptain Britain and MI: 13 #5–9, 120 pages, Panini Comics, June 2009,ISBN1-84653-423-2, Marvel Comics, July 2009,ISBN0-7851-3345-3)
Vampire State (collectsCaptain Britain and MI: 13 #10–15 + annual #1, 184 pages, Marvel Comics, October 2009,ISBN0-7851-3952-4)
^"2008 Hugo Nomination List".Denvention 3: The 66th World Science Fiction Convention. World Science Fiction Society. 2008. Archived fromthe original on 21 December 2008. Retrieved21 March 2008.
