Comic Book Questions Answered – where I answer whatever questions you folks might have about comic books (feel free to e-mail questions to me at brianc@cbr.com).

Adam F. asked me this on Twitter, and that's fine, but in general, it's easier if folks just e-mail me, because it took way too long to figure out that this question had been asked on Twitter. I mean, whatever, it's obviously not the end of the world or anything, but it's definitely easier for me if I have a record of who asked me the question like I do in my e-mail.

Anyhow, Adam asked in response to an article I did about Carol Danvers' time as the head of Woman Magazine for J. Jonah Jameson, "In those pages, Carol mentions her prospective Assistant Editor was a recovering alcoholic. When did Carol herself become an alcoholic? I've only ever read her recovery in the Avengers comics."

Okay, as I bet you're familiar with, after Carol Danvers' original series, Ms. Marvel, was canceled, the only title that she was appearing in was the Avengers, and since her membership in that title was almost assuredly designed to help sell her solo book, once there was no solo book to promote, then it wasn't like she was part of the plans that the Avengers' writer, David Michelinie, had for the series, so he wrote her off in Avengers #200 in a controversial tale that involved Carol marrying the son of Immortus and going off to live with him in literal Limbo. The problem was that Marcus (the aforementioned son of Immortus) had noted that he had used some machines to help get Carol to fall in love with him and the other Avengers heard that and thought, "Eh, who hasn't used machines to make someone fall in love with them, right?"

Well, fans thought that sounded really messed up and so Chris Claremont had Carol return from Limbo in Avengers Annual #10 (art by Michael Golden and Pablo Marcos) and she then lost all of her powers to Rogue of the (then) Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.

Carol explained to the Avengers then what had happened and how disappointed she had been at them for allowing Marcus to take her to Limbo...

Okay, so Carol hung out with the X-Men while healing herself mentally and she was kidnapped along with the X-Men by the evil aliens known as the Brood. They experimented on her and this kicked in new powers. She became a cosmically powered hero known as Binary.

Well, years later, she was knocked down in a battle during Operation: Galactic Storm and was essentially stuck on Earth again. In Avengers #348 (by Bob Harras, Kirk Jarvinen and Tom Palmer - as an aside, there are pages later in this issue that look like Tom Palmer practically re-drew them. It's kind of nuts how much he made these issues fit with the overall look of the series), Crystal hangs out with the recovering Carol and Carol explains how messed up her life is...

So that's the basic set-up for why Carol might want to turn to something like alcohol to comfort her. When she actually DID it would be about five years later...

Page 2: [valnet-url-page page=2 paginated=0 text='How did that demon get in that bottle?']

Kurt Busiek, George Perez and Al Vey relaunched the Avengers in 1998 following Heroes Reborn (where the Avengers went off to an alternate reality for a year or so) and they had every Avenger ever show up for a big battle that led to an alternate reality storyline. Once the big battle of the opening arc ended, the Avengers tried to figure out a new lineup in Avengers #4 (by Busiek, Perez, Vey and Bob Wiacek). Carol, deciding on a new name now that her Binary powers were no longer working (and not wanting to call herself Ms. Marvel anymore) decided that she had to rejoin the Avengers to make herself feel better about things.

However, Tony Stark noticed behavior that reminded him of, well, himself...

In the next issue, Carol is once again shown with alcohol...

She was so afraid that the Avengers wouldn't let her join if they knew that she had lost her Binary powers, she decided to hide the power loss from the rest of the team. That did not go over well in battle, like Avengers #5 (when the Avengers had to fight their allies, the Squadron Supreme)...

Cap begins to press the issue later in the issue and she freaks out and Iron Man asks Cap to back off (since he figures it has to do with her drinking and he wants to talk to her about it himself)...

However, things continued to deteriorate in the following issue...

And after things were settled, Captain America told Carol that they had to talk and she did not take it well...

Tony took the time to actually confront Carol about her issues in Iron Man #7 (by Kurt Busiek, Sean Chen, Eric Cannon and Sean Parsons)...

As you can see, she was not ready to hear it. Later, she drunkenly confronted Iron Man...

They were interrupted by an attack by the Kree. She snapped into action. She then tried to prove herself in front of Captain America in the second issue of the crossover by altering only Captain America when she found the Kree. She ended up getting captured by the end of the issue.

This led to Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch and Hawkeye going on a rescue mission in Quicksilver #10 (by John Ostrander, Joe Edkin, Derec Aucoin and Rich Faber. They succeed, but then she ends up accidentally getting SUPER drunk by drinking some Kree alcohol...

This leads to her drunkenly trying to "save the day" and accidentally injuring Lockjaw...

So the Avengers then court martial her in Avengers #7 (by Busiek, Perez and Vey)...

Since she quit before they could demote her, she then tried to fly to the moon to help them...

With her now at her lowest point, she decided whether she would turn to alcohol again...

She then became a recurring guest star in Busiek's two books, Iron Man and Avengers, as she dealt with her problems. If you're curious about how she got through her issues, I could probably cover that in a future column if folks are interested!

Anyhow, thanks for the question, Adam! If anyone else has a comic book related question, feel free to drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!