The much hyped two-hour season three premiere of NBC’s Heroes didn’t live up to expectations in the ratings.

The show was down 25% from last year’s season two premiere of the show, which has been on a nine-month hiatus thanks to the writers strike.

The show averaged at 9.9 million viewers, for the 9PM slot the show came in second after ABC’s Dancing With The Stars (averaged at 21.1 million viewers) and for the 10PM slot it came in second again behind CBS’s CSI: Miami (16.9 million viewers).

While The CW’s Gossip Girl held steady in the ratings with 3.4 million viewers, only down 300 thousand from last week’s all time high for the show.

The new season of Heroes is almost here so NBC threw a “Countdown To The Premiere” party at the The Edison Lounge on Sunday (September 7) in Los Angeles, CA.

Hayden Panettiere, Ali Larter, Milo Ventimiglia, Zachary Quinto, Dania Ramirez, Adrian Pasdar, Sendhil Ramamurthy and the rest of the cast were all in the house to celebrate the third season of the show which returns to returns to NBC with a 2-hour premiere on Monday September 22 .

More Photos After The Jump

For the past couple of months Kristen Bell has been shooting her new movie When In Rome and giving her voice to Gossip Girl.

But on Friday (August 8 ) the Forgetting Sarah Marshall hottie was back on the set of NBC’s Heroes, you may remember she appeared in 6 episodes at the end of Season 2 for the hit show.

A couple of months ago it was confirmed Bell would reprise her role as Elle Bishop for at least 5 episodes in the third season.

Hayden Panettiere attended the 2008 Teen Choice Awards at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Universal City, CA on Sunday (August 3).

The Heroes actress is nominated for three awards including Female Hottie, Red Carpet Fashion Icon Female and TV Actress Action Adventure which she goes against costar Ali Larter. The show is nominated for TV Show Action Adventure.

Hayden Panettiere put on a cute dress as she ran some errands in Los Angeles, CA on Tuesday (July 29).

The Heroes actress told press that her character Claire will undergo some big changes for the shows third season, she said “It’s a very different world and it’s kind of, as you can imagine, a world gone a little bit awry - and she’s a very different person than she was.”

She then continued saying she enjoyed playing two different versions of the character which made her a household name, “One of the cool things I think about this season is I get to play kind of two different characters for a second, because we pop back and forth a little bit from the present to the future.”

The third season premiers Monday, September 22 on NB.

The cast of Heroes came out for Comic Con 2008 at the San Diego Conference Center in San Diego, CA on Saturday (July 26). Milo Ventimiglia and girlfriend/costar Hayden Panettiere smiled and laughed with each other as they stood with the rest of the cast.

Fans who got to go to the event got to see the first hour of the season premiere, which aris Monday, September 22.

According to Kristin Dos Santos at E! the crowd gave the first hour of the two hour season premiere a good response.

The cast were asked to describe the new season in one word, Hayden said “Wonderful, magical”, while Milo said “Melt your head” and Ali Latter described it as “Fantastical”.

Click Here to listen to Hayden Panettiere’s debut single, Wake Up Call. Hayden called into KISS-FM’s morning show with Ryan Seacrest.

The Heroes actress called the song “very different, very diverse.” What do you think of the song? It reminds us of Paris Hilton’s single, Stars Are Blind.