Falling just 10 percent from last week's season opener, American Idol topped another Wednesday for Fox with a 5.4 rating among adults 18-49 and 16 million viewers. Compared to the second Wednesday outing from last season, Idol was down 16 percent -- more modest than the 29 percent drop that episode suffered, year over year.
Fast National returns give shared second place status in the key demo to CBS and ABC, both of which averaged a 2.4 with adults.
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CBS pulled in an average 10 million viewers over the night, starting with an encore of Criminal Minds (1.5 adults). An original outing of the series in its regular time slot was up a tenth of a point to a 3.0 adults rating before CSI (2.7 adults) jumped 17 percent to a new season high.
On ABC, The Middle (2.5 adults) and Neighbors (1.9 adults) were the network's only growers, moving up 9 and 6 percent respectively. Modern Family (4.1 adults) was down 5 percent to a season low before a steady Suburgatory (2.3 adults). Nashville dropped 18 percent to a 1.8 rating in the key demo. The network averaged 7.1 million viewers.
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Repeats brought NBC a 0.8 rating with adults 18-49 and 2.6 million viewers.
Arrow (1.1 adults) and Supernatural (0.9 adults) were both steady on the CW, giving the network an average 1.0 rating in the key demo and 2.6 million viewers.
Univision averaged a 1.6 rating with adults 18-49 and 3.8 million viewers.
