The good news: the first episode featuring the Top 36 semifinalists was up a bit from last week (24.9 million viewers per Nielsen estimates) with a night-best of 25.1 million from 8-10 p.m. The bad news: American Idol 8 isn’t just pulling the viewers like it used too last year. The ratings for this year was down a lot from last year’s 29 million! But, come to think of it, AI didn’t face new episodes of NCIS (18.1 million) or the not-yet-born The Mentalist (18.3 million) so I guess its latest ratings is still respectable =)

The ratings breakdown: Casey Carlson, Michael Sarver, and Ann Marie Boskovich (the semifinalists who sang from 9-9:30 p.m.) was American Idol’s most-watched half-hour (26 million) for the night and its highest-rated among likely female voters age 12-34. Bouncy Jackie Tohn, personality-challenged Ricky Braddy and potential frontrunner Alexis Grace, who drew the leadoff 8-8:30 p.m. slot, was the show’s least-watched half-hour (23 million).

Popularity: 1% [?]