Dan Hernandez returns to Coral Springs to receive Key to the City after successful Hollywood writing career
Coral Springs, Florida – Dan Hernandez’s journey from a Coral Springs comic shop to Hollywood received a hometown celebration last week when the city honored the writer with one of its highest recognitions.
Hernandez returned to Coral Springs on Wednesday, Aug. 19, to receive the Key to the City during a City Commission meeting. The honor marked a full-circle moment for someone whose early interests in comics and storytelling began in the same community he would eventually represent through a wide-ranging career in film, television and publishing.
Before his name appeared in the credits of major movies and television productions, Hernandez was a local student spending time at Comics & Cards on Wiles Road. The comic shop became part of his early connection to stories and characters, long before he began writing for some of the world’s better-known entertainment franchises.
Today, his credits include “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” “Pokémon Detective Pikachu” and the upcoming “Spaceballs: The New One,” also known as “Spaceballs 2.” Movies connected to his work have earned more than $500 million at the box office.
His television work has been just as varied. Hernandez served as co-showrunner and executive producer of “LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy” and created “Ultra Violet & Black Scorpion.” His work earned additional industry recognition when Variety named him one of its “10 Screenwriters to Watch” in 2019.
But Hernandez’s career did not begin in Hollywood. His education included NSU’s University School Coral Springs campus and Temple Beth Orr before he graduated from Brown University. From there, he developed a career that has moved between several forms of storytelling.
His writing extends beyond movies and television. Hernandez has published short fiction in science-fiction anthologies including “Pangea III: Redemption,” “Phenomenons: Every Human Creature” and “Phenomenons: Season of Darkness.”
He has also worked in comics, writing for Z2 Comics and contributing to Dark Horse’s “Minor Threats: Welcome to Twilight.”
That variety has helped make Hernandez’s career notable, but his connection to Coral Springs remains an important part of his story. The Key to the City was presented as a way for the community to recognize people whose accomplishments bring pride to Coral Springs.
For local young people interested in writing, filmmaking, animation or other creative fields, the recognition also offers a hometown example of what can happen when those interests develop into a career.
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Hernandez recently returned to another local setting, the Coral Springs Museum Center for the Arts, where he spoke about his path from Coral Springs schools to film sets and animation studios. He also answered questions from members of the audience.
His appearance gave residents an opportunity to hear directly about a career that has taken him from comic books and local classrooms to some of the biggest entertainment properties in the world.
Receiving the Key to the City brought that story back to its starting point. Hernandez’s career now stretches across blockbuster films, television projects, graphic novels and short fiction, but Coral Springs remains part of the foundation.
For the city, honoring Hernandez was not simply about his Hollywood credits. It was also about recognizing a former local student whose work has carried his creative ambitions far beyond the streets where they began.
And for Hernandez, the return to Coral Springs offered a chance to reconnect with the community that watched those ambitions take shape.
