PRIME-TIME TV RANKINGS

It’s looking like CBS has a companion hit to go with “Two and a Half Men” on Monday nights.

The audience for summer reruns of the sitcom “The Big Bang Theory” is up 52% over last summer. Nielsen Media Research figures released Tuesday showed that the series had nearly as many viewers as television’s top-rated comedy, “Two and a Half Men.”

Summertime second runs are often when a show catches on. That happened last year with “NCIS” on CBS, which last week was the most popular drama on television.

As evidence of how broadcast TV still has the upper hand: An “NCIS” rerun had more than three times the audience last week of the third-season premiere of AMC’s “Mad Men.” And that premiere was the most-watched show in AMC’s history.

CBS’ “60 Minutes” brought 12 million viewers in to watch Michael Vick’s apology Sunday.

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Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (Aug. 10-16) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number of people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 286 million potential viewers in the U.S. ages 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* Program Network Viewers 1 America’s Got Talent (Tue.) NBC 12.88 2 60 Minutes CBS 12.03 3 America’s Got Talent (Wed.) NBC 11.78 4 NCIS CBS 9.15 5 Two and a Half Men CBS 8.82 *--*

*--* 6 The Big Bang Theory CBS 8.64 7 The Mentalist CBS 7.64 Big Brother (Sun.) CBS 7.64 9 Big Brother (Thu.) CBS 7.48 10 Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Mon.) ABC 7.27 *--*

*--* 11 Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Thu.) ABC 7.24 12 CSI: Miami CBS 7.08 13 Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Sun.) ABC 7.02 14 Hell’s Kitchen FOX 6.92 15 CSI CBS 6.79 *--*

*--* 16 Big Brother (Tue.) CBS 6.78 17 CSI: NY CBS 6.75 18 Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Wed.) ABC 6.52 19 Dateline (Mon.) NBC 6.34 20 America’s Got Talent (Tue.) (8 p.m.) NBC 6.27 *--*

*--* 21 Wipeout ABC 6.18 22 Dateline (Fri.) NBC 6.15 23 Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (Tue.) ABC 6.07 24 America’s Got Talent: Recap NBC 6.03 25 Criminal Minds CBS 5.99 *--*

*--* 26 America’s Funniest Home Videos ABC 5.76 27 Shark Tank ABC 5.58 28 48 Hours Mystery CBS 5.57 29 Cold Case CBS 5.48 30 Primetime: Crime ABC 5.44 *--*

*--* 31 Neil Diamond: Hot August Night: NYC CBS 5.38 32 Family Guy FOX 5.30 33 Rules of Engagement CBS 5.25 34 Family Guy (9:30 p.m.) FOX 5.02 35 Manana Es Para Siempre (Wed.) UNI 4.98 *--*

*--* 36 Family Guy (8:30 p.m.) FOX 4.91 37 America’s Most Wanted: America Fights Back FOX 4.87 38 Manana Es Para Siempre (Thu.) UNI 4.84 39 The Simpsons FOX 4.74 40 Law & Order: Criminal Intent NBC 4.70 *--*

*--* 41 How I Met Your Mother CBS 4.69 42 Crimetime Saturday CBS 4.62 43 Manana Es Para Siempre (Tue.) UNI 4.59 44 Manana Es Para Siempre (Mon.) UNI 4.58 45 The Philanthropist NBC 4.54 *--*

*--* 46 Manana Es Para Siempre (Fri.) UNI 4.51 47 Bones FOX 4.46 48 Dating in the Dark ABC 4.43 49 There Goes the Neighborhood CBS 4.41 50 Bones (Wed.) FOX 4.29 *--*

*--* 51 Primetime: The Outsiders ABC 4.26 52 Cops (8:30 p.m.) FOX 4.14 53 20/20 (Fri.) ABC 4.13 54 Don Francisco Presenta UNI 4.10 *--*

Network averagesHere is the number of viewers (in millions) that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season.

*--* Network Last week Season to date CBS 6.25 9.93

NBC 5.27 6.78

ABC 4.33 7.42

FOX 4.05 8.08

UNI 3.09 3.72 *--*