'Revelations'-Fueled 'Law & Order' Crushes 'CSI: New York'

Fueled by the unexpected success of its new miniseries Revelations, NBC's Law & Order managed to beat CSI: New York by its largest margin of the year so far.

According to Variety, "Crime and Misdemeanor" was watched by only 10.6 million people, one of New York's worst performances ever, and certainly for a first-run episode. Law & Order, meanwhile, attracted 16.7 million viewers, its highest numbers since the start of the season. Over on ABC, new crime show Eyes also suffered, as it managed to get no more than 6.4 million viewers.

The success of Law & Order was primarily due to the unexpected success of Revelations, the new Armageddon-themed miniseries that aired an hour earlier, and after which a lot of viewers apparently decided to stay with NBC.. Revelations was watched by 15.3 million viewers, which was well below American Idol's 24.1 million, but still represented a big rise over usual time slot occupant The West Wing. Revelations will continue to air on Wednesdays for the rest of the season, so it seems CSI: New York is in for a lot of ratings-themed hurt.

Fortunately for CBS, the other two CSI shows were their usual strong self. On Monday, CSI: Miami's "Sex and Taxes" attracted 20.1 million viewers, giving it higher ratings than ABC and NBC combined. Everybody Loves Raymond and Two And A Half Men also did well, allowing CBS to claim an easy victory for the overall night.

Finally, Thursday's CSI episode "4x4" was watched by 27.1 million viewers, more than the double the number that tuned in for The Apprentice. Both Survivor: Palau before CSI and Without A Trace at 10:00pm also managed to crush the competition, giving CBS the ratings crown for this night, too. The network attracted an average of 22.5 million viewers for the three hours of primetime on Thursday, 144% above the closest competitor, NBC.

More can be found in Variety's full ratings reports for Monday, Wednesday and Thursday.

Discuss this news item at Talk CSI!
 Add CSI Files RSS feed to your news reader or My Yahoo!
Also a Desperate Housewives fan? Then visit GetDesperate.com!