Ask Dr. Rin!

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Ask Dr. Rin!
Dr.リンにきいてみて! (Dr. Rin ni Kiite Mite!)
Genre	Fantasy, Magical Girl, Romance, Shoujo
Manga
Authored by	Kiyoko Arai
Publisher	Shogakukan
Serialized in	Ciao
Original run	2000-03-25 – 2003-06-21
No. of volumes	8
TV anime
Directed by	Shin Misawa
Studio	Nippon Animation, NAS
Network	TV Tokyo
Original run	2001-04-05 – 2002-02-25
No. of episodes	51

Ask Dr. Rin! (Dr.リンにきいてみて!, Dr. Rin ni Kiite Mite!^?) is an eight volume manga series by Kiyoko Arai about a young girl named Meilin Kanzaki who is endowed with Feng shui powers which allow her to read people's fortunes and give advice on how to receive good luck. She does this on a website under the pseudonym of "Dr. Rin." She loves her friend Asuka Yuuki, who is a star on the school soccer team. However, she constantly bothers him with her Feng shui advice when he doesn't believe in any of that.

Ask Dr. Rin! was seralized in in Ciao and later adapted into a 51 episode anime series by Nippon Animation, directed by Shin Misawa and broadcased by TV Tokyo from 5 April 2001 to 25 February 2002.

[edit] Characters

Meirin Kanzaki: The main character, Meirin is a teenage girl with the power of feng-shui divination, an ability which her brother argues surpasses her father's. Most other characters tend to agree, if not through their actions then by flocking to her web-based divination service, for which she uses the pseudonym "Dr. Rin." Unfortunately, the online service costs her father, who does his own feng-shui divination service, many of his customers, and so she tries hard to keep her secondary identity a secret. The only other person who knows is her brother, Koumi, who helps her keep her service running. A bit ditzy by nature, Meirin is nevertheless pure-hearted in her pursuits, the most notable of which is Asuka Yuuki. Throughout the series she is seen trying to aid him using her abilities, even at one point buying him pink boxers in desperation because she had a bad premonition that day about him and knew that pink was his lucky color for that day. None of this tends to be met with gratitude by Asuka, who doesn't believe in the occult, nor does he understand Meirin's fascination with it. Meirin also owns a special hakke crystal which her grandfather reveals was given to her in order to protect her. It activates when she or one of her friends is in trouble and unleashes the power of Shenlong, a dragon god.

Voiced by Saeko Chiba

Asuka Yuuki: Asuka Yuuki is the boy who Meirin loves to no end. While he has never stated that he loves her, his own feelings tend to jettison between protective affection and frustrated annoyance. The two are childhood friends, and their families are on very close terms as well. His frustration tends to show mostly when Meirin tries to help him her way, with feng-shui. Devoted to reality, Asuka constantly derides her well-intentioned efforts. He immediately hops to her rescue, however, once something threatens her, such as when Tokiwa starts stalking and threatening her in order to get her to go love him instead of Asuka. However, his lack of ability with magic can lead him to wind up in very dangerous situations once he does decide to confront enemies. A member of the school soccer team, Asuka is often seen with Shinagawa, his best friend, who is also a member of the soccer team.

Voiced by Takayuki Sorita

Takashi Tokiwa: Often referred to as Tokiwachi by the rest of the characters, Tokiwa is a transfer student who moved to Meirin's school apparently solely for the purpose of wooing her. He is an enormous flirt and mostly fits the stereotype of a "pretty boy." Even though he insists that he only loves Meirin, he seems to delight in the attention that all of the other girls pay to him. Meirin, however, does not return his affections, a fact that increasingly drives him to violent acts that he manipulates through his powers as an onmyōji. With these abilities, he can divine the future as well as control "shikigami," which are paper dolls that can become physical beings, like a person or a rat. In one episode, he also showed an ability with a flute that paralyzed Asuka when he tried to confront him. Through this, he can create enormous problems, such as setting the school on fire or driving a bus Asuka was riding on off a bridge. While all this is going on, he sends Meirin e-mails promising more disaster to come and consistently signs them, "Your destined lover." He has also at certain points referred to a special "power" that Meirin has and he wants to obtain, casting into doubt whether his motives are truly about love. He has joined the soccer team, and uses that as an opportunity to compete against Asuka for Meirin's affections.

Voiced by Yuuto Kazama