Thursday Ratings: Big Shots Up, Apprentice Down

Big Shots' Christopher Titus and Charisma Carpenter courtesy Vivian Zink/ABC
Thursday's first-run highlights:
8 pm/ET
Ugly Betty topped the hour with 10 million total viewers, a gain of 600K from its last fresh episode (Dec. 6). The last new
30 Rock (blargh) drew six mil, a 420 thou increase from Dec. 13.
9 pm
CSI was No. 1 in viewers (18.1 mil, down 1.7 from Dec. 13), while
Grey's Anatomy (17.6 mil) claimed the lead in key demos. Week 2 of
Celebrity Apprentice, delivering 8.1 mil, plunged 26 percent from its premiere.
10 pm
Without a Trace (13.2 mil, slipping almost two mil from Dec. 13) bested
ER (9.1 mil), though NBC eked out a win in demos. The oft-delayed arrival of
Charisma Carpenter (I would like to think) led
Big Shots to a 27 percent gain over its previous episode. (Though the audience for ABC's freshman series now stands at just 6.8 mil, making a big deal out of the increase gives me an excuse to run the photo above right.)