Fox's 'Idol' Beats Other Five Nets, Collectively

"American Idol" continued to be the nuclear bomb in broadcast television--leveling the field of contenders.

"Idol"'s special two-hour "performance" show on Tuesday night witnessed towering numbers--13.6/33 among adult 18-49 viewers and 33.2 million viewers overall. Taking on all contenders, it beat the five other broadcast networks' shows--combined--in both rating and share.

Even then, "Idol" couldn't top "Idol" versus the week before--its numbers were the same, the top-rated performance program in the show's history.

Against all of this, CBS's new military drama "The Unit" continued to hang on with a respectable 4.2/9 among adult 18-49 viewers, and 15.3 million viewers. "Unit"'s numbers were down a bit from its previous airing.

Other big shows of the evening: NBC's "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" took in its usual win for its time period--although its 4.8/12 in 18-49 and 13.4 million viewers were down somewhat.

One big loser, ABC's new comedy "Sons & Daughters," continued to play a mop-up role for the network against the powerful "Idol." It grabbed a weak-sounding 1.8/4 in 18-49 and 4.3 million viewers overall).

Early Nielsen 18-49 average ratings for Tuesday night look like this: Fox, 13.6/33; CBS, 3.6/9; NBC, 3.1/8; ABC, 2.2/5; WB, 1/2; UPN 0.7/2.

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