ABC's 'Lost' Returns, but Some of Its Ratings Are Still Gone

After three months off the air, the much ballyhooed return of "Lost" logged a lousy 14.5 million viewers, the smallest audience ever for an original episode.

The return episode also garnered the show's smallest rating this season among the 18-to-49-year-olds ABC targets.

On the bright side, ABC noted that "Lost" surged from its lead-in -- a "Lost" recap clip job -- by nearly 6 million viewers.

The bad news: That "Lost Survival Guide" is probably the best lead-in "Lost" is going to see for a while; the network is supposed to bring back its Wednesday 9 p.m. comedies starting next week.

ABC noted that the "Lost" return snagged the show's second best rating of the season among 18-to-34-year-olds.

Yes, "Lost" officially has become "Heroes"-esque -- good with younger demos, but not the broad, country-sweeping series it once was.

But "Heroes" is a series just beginning its run on TV, and it appears headed for ratings growth. This season for "Lost," on the other hand, is shaping up -- as we're sure Winston Churchill would have said had anyone asked -- not as the end of "Lost," but definitely the end of the beginning of "Lost."

After airing just six episodes of its convoluted serialized drama series, ABC rested "Lost" for three months rather than air reruns; reruns had not gone over well with fans last season, as reflected in the show's ratings.

ABC also moved the show from 9 to 10 p.m. Wednesdays, to protect it from "American Idol."

In its ratings analysis yesterday, ABC mentioned that in its new slot, "Lost" defeated CBS's "CSI: NY" by 42 percent among those coveted 18-to-49-year-olds, and by 94 percent among the 18-to-34-year-olds who are now the Holy Grail of Madison Avenue. This is known as damning with faint praise, given the demographic skew of the CBS drama.

Ditto ABC's talking point about "Lost" posting the network's best numbers in the Wednesday 10 p.m. time slot since last May.