'Charlie Brown Christmas' wins ratings fight

Good grief, the animated holiday specials keep racking up ratings victories.

Wednesday night’s annual telecast of A Charlie Brown Christmas won the 8 p.m. hour for ABC and was up 4 percent from last year. The Peanuts gang’s 47-year-old special — the most popular of the Peanuts franchise’s animated programs — delivered 8.9 million viewers and a 2.9 adults 18-49 rating. That outdrew CBS’ Survivor: Philippines (10.4 million, 2.7 rating) and Fox’s The X-Factor (8.1 million, 2.8) among adults 18-49.

CBC also tied CBS’ Criminal Minds as the second highest-rated show of the night and topped NBC’s annual Christmas in Rockefeller Center special (9.1 million, 2.1) and its SNL Christmas special (8.7 million, 2.7).

Still, just because the Charlie Brown special performed strong, doesn’t mean other shows did poorly — especially compared to last week when the Thanksgiving holiday was impacting viewership levels.

On Fox, Factor was up 27 percent. NBC had some good news too — that Rockefeller Center special hit a four-year high in the ratings (in this case, one suspects NBC’s rising ratings tide this fall deserves the credit). Survivor was up 17 percent this week, with CBS’ Minds up 7 percent and CSI up 8 percent. Over on ABC, Modern Family was up a tenth, with Suburgatory up 8 percent. Nashville was flat. On The CW, Arrow was steady, but Supernatural dipped a bit. See the full chart for all the details below: