Weekly Ratings: 5/20 – 5/25

Saturday & Sunday Ratings: Conan's Tonight Show, MTV Movie Awards and More

Some recent ratings highlights:

• The premiere of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien delivered the best numbers (a 7.1/17 rating) for a Monday Tonight Show in more than four years, and the seventh-highest Monday overnights for Tonight since Jay Leno took over as host in 1992.

Compared to his final Late Night broadcast, Conan's audience was up 173 percent. (Read Mickey O'Connor's "snap judgement" of Conan's Tonight Show.)

• The 2009 MTV Movie Awards averaged 5.3 million total viewers, a year-to-year increase of 73 percent and the show's biggest audience since 2004.

• On Saturday night, Harper's Island held steady at 3.85 mil, and Pushing Daisies returned to an audience of 2.35 mil.

Monday & Tuesday Ratings: I'm a Celebrity, Jon & Kate, SVU Finale and More

Some more recent ratings highlights:

• Monday's two-hour premiere of NBC's I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here! averaged 6.35 million viewers, edging out The Bachelorette (6.34 mil) in both total audience and the demos. I'm a Celebrity then dropped 14 percent (to 5.5 mil) on Tuesday.

• Among finales, Medium wrapped up its NBC run with an audience of 7.38 mil, dipping 370K week-to-week. (This fall: Fridays on CBS!) According to Jim on Tuesday had its last laughs before an audience of 4.1 mil, while SVU's season-ender copped 11.37 mil.
• On Tuesday, Fox's Mental (5.04 mil) slipped 13 percent from its premiere.

• Conan O'Brien's second outing as Tonight Show host dropped 30 percent from his debut, Still, NBC notes, it was Tonight's best Tuesday rating in more than two years and Conan handily bested Letterman by 67 percent.

• TLC's Jon & Kate Plus 8 was minus 42 percent of its season-premiere audience, averaging 5.7 million viewers on Monday.

• The Sunday conclusion of Lifetime's Maneater miniseries drew 3 million viewers and gave the cabler its best demos delivery of the year.

Wednesday Ratings: Law & Order Rises, the Non-Celebrities Fall

8 pm/ET
ABC's Wipeout (8.37 million total viewers) once again squeaked past the first half of So You Think You Can Dance, though the Fox series topped the demos and averaged 8.76 mil over its two-hour run. I'm a Celebrity drew 4.78 million, down 13 percent from the night prior and off a full 25 percent from its Monday premiere.

9 pm
Night two of NBC's Inside the Obama White House special drew nearly 9 mil, besting a Criminal Minds repeat. ABC's The Goode Family (averaging 2.67 mil across two episodes) got worse, plunging 32 percent from its premiere. Surviving Suburbia returns to the 9:30 slot next week.

10 pm
Law & Order's 19th season finale copped 8.8 mil, up 31 percent from its last fresh episode. Lagging far, far behind a CSI: NY repeat, The Unusuals dropped 25 percent to hit a new all-time low of 2.94 mil.

Thursday Ratings: Game 1 of NBA Finals Shoots and Scores for ABC

8 pm/ET
ABC's coverage of Game 1 of the NBA Finals — which was kicked off by a Jimmy Kimmel special — topped every hour and was the night's most watched program, averaging 9.4 million viewers from 8 to 11 pm. In the 8 o'clock hour, I'm a Celebrity placed fourth (behind repeats of Bones and CBS comedies) with 5.18 mil. That is, however, an 8 percent gain from the night prior. Speidi wants to take credit for the bump, I am sure.

9 pm
So You Think You Can Dance's reveal of the Top 20 bested a CSI repeat by drawing 8.2 mil, but dipped 10 percent week-to-week. The premiere of NBC's The Listener placed fourth with 5.25 mil.

10 pm
A second episode of The Listener drew 5.34 mil, lagging far behind basketball and a Mentalist repeat.