Primetime Ratings: American Idol Finale a Good Cook

Fox Beats All Other Networks Combined on Wednesday Night

By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 5/22/2008 7:51:00 AM

Fox averaged an 11 rating/29 share for the finale of American Idol, where the dark horse David (Cook) ran away with the crown.

Fox beat all of the other networks combined in the demo, as well as total viewers (17.3 million), with enough left over to fit a few more networks. But that was still well below the 13.3/32 it averaged for last year's finale in the 18-49 demo and, in that case, its last hour was up against the first hour of the finale of Lost, which averaged a 5.8/15.

The strongest rating against this year's finale was CBS’ Criminal Minds with a 3.3/8 in the demo.

On the strength of Minds, CBS was second with a 2.7/7 in the demo, followed by NBC with a 1.7/4, ABC with a 1.2/3 and The CW with a 0.6/2.

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