After Fox’s `Idol,’ CBS Dominates TV Ratings

NEW YORK (AP) — After Fox’s “American Idol,” the television landscape lately has become pretty clear: There’s CBS, and there’s everybody else.

The two versions of “Idol” last week were the most popular programs on TV, the only shows with more than 20 million viewers, the Nielsen Co. said Tuesday. The next 16 shows on Nielsen’s list were all on CBS, including the premiere of Forest Whitaker’s new drama, “Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior.” It had more viewers last week than the show it was spun off, “Criminal Minds.”

Ten of those 16 programs were the genre that’s in CBS’ wheelhouse: crime or legal-oriented procedural dramas.

While last week may have included Valentine’s Day, two new relationship-oriented comedies are struggling mightily out of the box. NBC’s Thursday comedy “Perfect Couples” barely had more than 3 million viewers, while Fox’s “Traffic Light” had 3.5 million viewers.

CBS averaged 11.2 million viewers for the week (6.8 rating, 12 share). Fox had 9.6 million (5.5, 9), ABC had 6.6 million (4.1, 7), NBC had 5.5 million (3.5, 6), the CW had 1.8 million (1.1, 2) and ION Television had 1.2 million (0.8, 1).

Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision led with a prime-time average of 3.7 million viewers (1.9 rating, 3 share). Telemundo had 1 million viewers and TeleFutura 930,000 (both 0.5, 1) and Azteca and Estrella both had 230,000 viewers (both 0.1, 0).

NBC’s “Nightly News” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 9 million viewers (5.8, 12). ABC’s “World News” was second with 8 million (5.3, 11) and the “CBS Evening News” had 6.1 million viewers (4.1, 8).

A ratings point represents 1,159,000 households, or 1 percent of the nation’s estimated 115.9 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions tuned to a given show.

For the week of Feb. 14-20, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: “American Idol” (Wednesday), Fox, 23.2 million; “American Idol” (Thursday), Fox, 22.18 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 19.4 million; “NCIS: Los Angeles,” CBS, 16.8 million; “The Mentalist,” CBS, 15.01 million; “Two and a Half Men,” CBS, 14.51 million; “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,” CBS, 13.29 million; “Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior,” CBS, 13.06 million; “Mike & Molly,” CBS, 12.92 million; “Criminal Minds,” CBS, 12.85 million.