Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on June 2012

An adaptation of a novel by Hunter S. Thompson, written in the ’60s but not published until 1998 at the urging of Johnny Depp, this is the story about what might or might not have happened if Thompson had not been rejected for a job on a Puerto Rican newspaper. It’s a nice-looking, agreeable time-waster with a few chuckles about the madcap antics of hard-drinking newspapermen. But the narrative is fuzzy (though more coherent than Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas), the main character’s character arc from drunk to activist is unexplained, and the whole effort has an unfinished feeling.