The half-hour launches as the top comedy premiere, new or returning, of the summer.

NBC's string of Thursday editions of Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update got off to a competitive start last night.

At 9 o'clock, the half-hour special averaged a 1.2 rating among adults 18-49. That put it behind only CBS' typically dominant Big Brother in the key demographic. And while that number is quite far south of the one Nielsen originally reported, one of many grossly skewed by preseason NFL, it is still the top comedy performance from a Big Four show this summer.

Weekend Update, which also jumped 71 percent from its reality lead-in (The Wall), averaged 4.7 million viewers for the night. Even with sliding linear ratings across broadcast, both of those numbers are steady with when NBC last played with Weekend Update in the middle of the week back in 2012. This is just a four-week run for Weekend Update's Colin Jost and Michael Che. The show will wrap when SNL gets back into full production.

As for the night's top performer, Big Brother is currently averaging a 1.9 rating among adults 18-49 and 5.9 million viewers.

The next installment of ABC's The Story of Diana took a 0.7 rating and nearly 4.9 million viewers.