• by Wayne Friedman , September 22, 2010

Fox rebounded on Tuesday, the second night of the new TV season, with a big "Glee" premiere -- this after delivering a nearly DOA offering of a new drama "Lone Star" on Monday.

"Glee" rocketed to a big Nielsen preliminary 5.5 rating/16 share, putting the hurt on CBS' "NCIS" (3.9/11) and ABC's "Dancing with the Stars: Results Show" (2.6/7) during the 8 p.m. to 9 p.m time period. Both the CBS and ABC's shows were down from their season-ago debuts.

One caveat: "Dancing" of a year ago wasn't a "results" show, but a "performance" show -- which typically posts higher numbers than its results shows.

At 9 p.m., with "Glee" over, "Dancing" resumed its stronger ways, at a 4.3/11. CBS' "NCIS: Los Angeles" took in a 3.4/9 and NBC's "The Biggest Loser" earned a 3.3/9, both down a considerable 25% from their year-ago numbers.

But given the ongoing time-shifting nature of television, networks are analyzing comparisons to the finales of their respective shows. For example, CBS says both "NCIS" series premieres are higher than their respective finales of a year ago.

New Tuesday shows ranged from the good to ordinary in terms of ratings.

The lead-in of "Glee" gave "Raising Hope" a fair 3.1/8, at 9 p.m., which in turn gave "Running Wilde" a slimmer 2.5/7.

The 10 p.m. period for all the networks on Tuesday night was not noteworthy. The second hour of CBS' "NCIS: Los Angeles" drifted in with a 3.0/8, and ABC's new show "Detroit 1-8-7" offered up a ho-hum 2.4/7 -- the same numbers as NBC's "Parenthood," which gave up 10% of its 18-49 viewers this week compared to its season debut of a week ago.

Fox ended the night at a 4.1/11; CBS was next with a 3.4/9, followed by ABC with a 3.1/9, NBC at a 2.7/8, Univision at a 1.8/5; and CW with a 0.8/2.