This is "Provide Some Answers," which is a feature where long unresolved plot points are eventually resolved. Today, we look at what happened to Kristy Watson, the precocious teenage cousin of Mary Jane Watson who struggled with an eating disorder!

It all started early in Gerry Conway's run on Spectacular Spider-Man, when he had Mary Jane bump into her cousin, Kristy, in Spectacular Spider-Man #145 (art by Sal Buscema)...

So Kristy begins to live with Mary Jane and Peter.

In the following issue, we get our first hint that Kristy has an eating problem, as Mary Jane notes that she always sees Kristy eating and yet Kristy never gains any weight...

That issue also sets up Kristy's flirtatious behavior with Peter...

Peter and Mary Jane get some privacy back in Web of Spider-Man #47 (by Conway and artists Alex Saviuk and Keith Williams), when one of Aunt May's boarders suggest that Kristy move into Aunt May's house instead...

Peter and Mary Jane visit them in Amazing Spider-Man #313 (by David Michelinie and Todd McFarlane) and Kristy continues her school girl crush on Peter...

but we also continue to note that she is eating a lot...

Amusingly enough, after finally getting some privacy again, Peter and Mary Jane are evicted and have to move in with Aunt May and Kristy...

Kristy continues her flirtatious behavior in the next issue...

Peter and Mary Jane then get their own place again. Web of Spider-Man #53 (by Conway, guest-artist Mark Bagley and Williams) takes things to the next level when Aunt May notices bruises on Kristy...

now it is clear that something is terribly wrong with Kristy...

and the issue ends with her collapsed in the bathroom...

We get the diagnosis in the following issue (Saviuk back on pencils)...

Kristy sneaks out of the hospital and goes to Peter and MJ's apartment, where she collapses. They rush her back to the hospital and then Mary Jane gives her some tough love...

In the next issue, we meet Kristy's parents and they are a piece of work...

Yiiiikes.

So now she's MJ and Peter's responsibility, right?

We get some nice Mary Jane and Kristy scenes in Web #61...

And finally, Kristy is discharged in Web of Spider-Man #69, only to be given a live-in nanny job by Harry Osborn and Liz Allan...

That baaaasically resolves the Kristy storyline.

However, we see her at Christmas in Spectacular Spider-Man #173 (by David Michelinie, Gerry Conway and Sal Buscema)...

And she's over at Aunt May's in Web of Spider-Man #84 (by Howard Mackie, Alex Saviuk and Keith Williams)....

They haven't mentioned her as the Osborns' nanny, so maybe she quit and went back to living with Aunt May? Her only appearances before the Spectacular Christmas issue were also with Aunt May and Willie Lumpkin, so I dunno.

Her final appearance for YEARS was at a surprise birthday party for Peter in Spider-Man #23 (by Erik Larsen)...

Then she just disappeared. Conway was off the books and obviously with him gone, so, too, went the supporting character he introduced. That's a fairly normal thing for this sort of deal. Harry Osborn died and I imagine Liz Allan no longer wanted a live-in nanny. Aunt May then "died," too, and then came back to life. So what became of Kristy?

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Now, do note that Kristy DID pop up as an adult in the alternate continuity series, Spider-Girl, set when Peter and Mary Jane are older (Peter is retired as Spider-Man) and their teenage daughter, May, becomes a superhero. That was out of continuity, but fair enough, she made appearances there.

As for within Marvel's main continuity, in Peter Parker Spider-Man #19 (by Howard Mackie, John Romita Jr. and Scott Hanna), Peter is refusing to deal with the apparent death of Mary Jane and so his friends and family put together an intervention when a box belonging to Mary Jane shows up after being missing with the airlines....

As you can see, Kristy appears to have gone to live with Mary Jane's sister, Gayle, and her two kids.

Fine solution, Howard Mackie! I'm impressed anyone even though to resolve it after EIGHT YEARS since her last appearance.

Someone should bring Kristy back!

If anyone has a suggestion for a long-resolved comic book plot, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!