Francis Manapul helps Marvel PR maven Arune Singh propose

Comics really can bring people together. Take, for instance, the above art by Francis Manapul, who created it as a favor for a friend who was proposing to his girlfriend. That friend is none other than Arune Singh, Marvel’s director of communications.

“It’s really a sweet story,” Manapul explains on his DeviantArt blog, “as [Arune] put a picture book together of them and this was revealed on the last page of the book as he got down on one knee to propose. ”

At Singh’s direction, Manapul depicted him as Superboy and Arune’s fiancée Michelle as Wonder Girl. Although it might seem odd for a Marvel staffer to ask a DC-exclusive artist for help on popping the big question, at the end of the day there are many friendships across the stretches of the Big Two. And this isn’t the first time a comics fan — or comics professional — has used the powerful language of comic to pop the big question: Cartoonist Dave Roman famously did an elaborate comic strip to spring the surprise question to his now-wife Raina Telgemeier, and I recall Rob Liefeld doing the same in the mid-’90s as a back-up to one of his comics.

… and before you ask, she said yes. Congratulations, Arune — and congrats, Michelle!