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So, Which Shows Were No. 1 in 2010?

by Joal Ryan Tue., Dec. 21, 2010 1:55 PM PST

Glee, Naya Rivera, Cory Monteith Justin Lubin/FOX

Who was Glee's biggest guest star? Which Real Housewives bout knocked out the most viewers? And which vampire bite bit the deepest?

A look at 2010's greatest ratings hits:

READ THIS: Pipin'-hot Spoiler Chat!

• Glee topped out on April 13 with "Hell-O" (13.7 million viewers). The episode benefitted from Gwyneth Paltrow  Britney Spears Idina Menzel and Jonathan Groff—and an extremely helpful American Idol lead-in. 

• Glee's biggest episode not boosted by Idol was Sept. 28's Spears-boosted "Britney/Brittany" (13.5 million). 

• The Real Housewives franchise hit a new high (or low) with Aug. 30's New Jersey reunion shoving match (3.9 million).

• Jersey Shore hit a new high (or low) with Sept. 30's Snooki-Angelina disagreement brawl (6.7 million).

• In a twist, Keeping Up With the Kardashians set a new network record on Feb. 28 (4.8 million) without resorting to fisticuffs. (The episode was marked by the birth of Kourtney Kardashian's son, Mason.)

• Vampire Diaries was the top CW drama; the top Vampire Diaries was Feb. 4's "Children of the Damned" (4 million).

• True Blood was the top vampire show; the top True Blood was Aug. 29's "Fresh Blood" (5.4 million).

• Zombies topped vampires, thanks to The Walking Dead, which topped out with Dec. 5's season finale (6 million). 

• American Idol, which averaged 24.8 million for its Tuesday shows, topped everything.

• The Jan. 18 iCarly special, iSaved Your Life, was cable's No. 1 entertainment show (12.4 million).

• Saturday Night Live's biggest guest host was (who else?) Betty White (12.1 million on May 8).

• SNL's second-biggest guest host was (now, this is a bit unexpected…) Paul Rudd (7.6 million on Dec. 11).

• For the fall season through Dec. 5, the broadcast show that added, on average, the most DVR viewers after a week's worth of playback was Modern Family Grey's Anatomy Hawaii Five-O (3.2 million). Parenthood and Fringe grew their audiences by the biggest percentage.  

• The most-watched animated holiday special was Charlie Brown Christmas Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (12.2 million).

Elsewhere, here were the week's 10 most-watched (non-football) shows, per the latest Nielsen Media Research broadcast rankings: 

  1. NCIS, 19.9 million viewers
  2. 60 Minutes, 18.7 million
  3. NCIS: Los Angeles, 16.8 million
  4. Two and a Half Men, 14 million
  5. Criminal Minds, 13.8 million
  6. Survivor: Nicaragua (Sunday finale), 13.6 million
  7. The Big Bang Theory, 13.2 million
  8. Survivor: Nicaragua (Wednesday), 12.3 million
  9. Mike & Molly, 12 million
  10. The Good Wife, 11.8 million

VOTE NOW: What was the best show of 2010?

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