Who created the television series The Wonder Years?

Neal Marlens and Carol Black created The Wonder Years.

The two writers were already known for their work on the family sitcom Growing Pains when they developed the series. They wanted to tell a family story through the eyes of an ordinary boy while placing him in the socially turbulent late 1960s, a period that shaped the baby-boomer generation.

Marlens and Black wrote the pilot and pitched the project to television networks. ABC was the only network willing to make an agreement, and the series premiered in 1988 with Fred Savage as Kevin Arnold and Daniel Stern providing the adult Kevin's narration.

The creators drew partly on their own childhood experiences. Marlens originally imagined a setting inspired by Huntington, Long Island, while Black contributed elements from her upbringing in Silver Spring, Maryland. ABC preferred an unspecified Anytown, USA setting, helping the show feel broadly relatable rather than tied to one exact community.