Charlton Brooker (born 3 March 1971) is an English screenwriter, producer, presenter, author, cartoonist, and social critic. He first became known for creating and presenting satirical television shows that featured criticism of modern society and the media, such as Screenwipe, Gameswipe, Newswipe, and Weekly Wipe.

Brooker came to wider prominence as the creator, writer, and executive producer of the dystopian anthology series Black Mirror. His other work includes writing for comedy series such as Brass Eye, Cunk on Earth, The 11 O'Clock Show, and Nathan Barley, creating the horror drama series Dead Set, writing social criticism pieces for The Guardian, co-founding and designing the logo for second-hand retailer CeX, and serving as a creative director for the production company Zeppotron.

Charlton Brooker was born on 3 March 1971 in Reading, Berkshire. He grew up in a "relaxed" Quaker household in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell, Oxfordshire. His parents, who were fans of the sitcom Bewitched, named him Charlton after a character featured in one episode and his sister Samantha after the show's main character. As a teenager, he first worked as a writer and cartoonist for Oink!

After attending Wallingford School, Brooker attended the University of Westminster (known as the Polytechnic of Central London until his final year there) to study for a Bachelor of Arts in Media Studies; he later revealed that he did not graduate because he wrote his dissertation on video games, considered an unacceptable topic for a dissertation. He has listed his comedic influences as Monty Python, The Young Ones, Blackadder, Chris Morris, and Vic Reeves.

Brooker did some early work as a cartoonist and worked in the video game department of Music and Video Exchange, a retailer in Notting Hill Gate. He and some other employees left to co-found the second-hand retailer CeX. Brooker worked in their first shop and produced cartoon advertisements, and designed their logo.

After some of Brooker's CeX cartoons were printed in the magazine PC Zone, he was invited to write for the magazine. His early reviews included System Shock (1994) and Fallout (1997). Brooker wrote for the magazine throughout the mid- to late-1990s. Aside from games reviews, his output included the comic strip "Cybertwats" and a column titled "Sick Notes", where Brooker would insult anyone who wrote in to the magazine – and offered a £50 prize to the best letter.

One of Brooker's one-shot cartoons caused the magazine to be pulled from the shelves of many British newsagents. The cartoon was titled "Helmut Werstler's Cruelty Zoo" and professed to be an advert for a theme park created by a Teutonic psychologist for children to take out their violent impulses on animals rather than humans. It was accompanied by photoshopped pictures of children smashing the skulls of monkeys with hammers, jumping on a badger with a pitchfork, and chainsawing an orang-utan, among other things. The original joke was supposed to be at the expense of the Tomb Raider games, known at the time for the number of animals killed, but the original title, "Lara Croft's Cruelty Zoo", was changed for legal reasons. In October 2008, Brooker and several other ex-writers were invited back to review a game for the 200th issue. Brooker reviewed Euro Truck Simulator.

Brooker began writing a TV review column titled "Screen Burn" for The Guardian newspaper's Saturday entertainment supplement The Guide in 2000, a role he continued until October 2010.