'Charlie Brown Thanksgiving' draws biggest audience in 4 years

It’s remarkable how strong the Charlie Brown specials continue to perform in the ratings, year after year.

A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving is not the most popular entry in the beloved animated franchise (both A Charlie Brown Christmas and It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown deliver bigger numbers). Yet the program still managed to hold its own against CBS’ Survivor and Fox’s The X-Factor (in fact, the special edged out Factor in total viewers, see below). Plus, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving delivered its biggest audience in four years — 8.1 million viewers and a 2.2 rating in the adult demo, up 22 percent from last year. Pretty spry for a 39-year-old repeat, huh?

As for the rest of the programs last night, well … only the most masochistic of TV showrunners and network executives even look at ratings during a holiday week (which is to say, pretty much all of them). Everything slipped from last week, with CBS’ CSI dropping the least (only 8 percent) and NBC’s Law & Order: SVU falling the most (down 24 percent).

If you’re wondering what to watch today, check out our guide to all the Thanksgiving weekend TV marathons that networks have planned.

Here’s your full chart, repeats marked with an “R”: