Nellie Andreeva

American Idol‘s ratings slide continues. Last night’s episode posted a 5.9/17 in 18-49 and 18.2 million viewers, down 8% in the demo from last Wednesday’s fast national. Compared with the same week last year, the veteran singing competition was down 34%. Idol was followed by Mobbed (2.9/7), which was up 123% from its previous original two weeks ago. But that original followed a Mobbed repeat, so last night, the flash mob series’ lead-in went up 500%, and it was able to capitalize only on a fraction of it. It was down 19% from what the Touch preview logged in the hour last week. Fox (4.4/12, 13.1 million) won the night in 18-49 and total viewers against mostly rerun competition on the Big 3 networks.

Finally some good news for NBC’s 8-9 PM comedy block, which has been dropping in the ratings since it relaunched with Whitney and Are You There Chelsea last month. Both Whitney (1.7/5) and Chelsea (1.7/5) were up 21% from last week. NBC aired drama repeats at 9 PM and 10 PM. Ditto for CBS, which opened the night with its annual Super Bowl’s Greatest Commercials special (2.1/6) at 8 PM, up a tenth from last year. ABC aired all reruns. But discouraging news for the CW’s low-rated new reality series Remodeled. Despite the big launch — the network aired the first two episodes multiple times a week — the show’s first original outing in its regular Wednesday 9 PM slot managed a 0.3/1, down a tenth from its last original on Tuesday night and matching its series premiere for a series low. Its lead-in, One Tree Hill (0.7/2), held steady.

TV Editor Nellie Andreeva - tip her here.