"My Name Is Earl" Rises, "Ugly Betty" Dips

Something strange happened on the comedy front last night - ABC's breakout hit of the season "Ugly Betty" dipped to 11,6 million viewers, while NBC's critically-acclaimed comedies "My Name Is Earl" and "The Office" won the 8pm hour in the 18-49 demo.

With the rest of the ABC line-up in repeats, viewers may not have realized the network aired an all-new episode of "Ugly Betty" last night. Hopefully the numbers will perk up next week.

"Earl" opened the evening for NBC with over 10 million viewers, beating CBS's CSI rerun in the 18-49 demo (4.3 vs. 3.5).

CSI quickly rose to the top as an all-new episode won the 9pm hour as well as the entire evening with over 25 million viewers.

Do note, however, that CSI was off 2 million viewers as opposed to last year, and also Grey's Anatomy was a repeat last night.

Finally, the news about its imminent demise did not help The O.C.'s ratings. The drama that managed to improve while competition aired reruns during December, went back to its disappointing November levels scoring only 3,9 million viewers.

TELEVISIONISTA.Net