I love this show. I too thought the opener was not as over the top as some of the others, but I seem to recall thinking the same thing last year. My theory is that they don't want to drive away first time veiwers who tune in for the season opener.
There is a whole seiries of behind the scenes videos on Hulu right now. The seem to indicate that in future episodes, there will be plenty of "edge" coming up. One of my favorite things about this show is that it brings back characters from earlier epsisodes and has lot of running gags. The Tranny is a perfect example. It looks like later this season the McPoyle's are back!
http://www.hulu.com/watch/170365/its...iew#s-p1-sr-i0