Not just anyone gets a funeral sendoff in a rocketship like Hunter S. Thompson. But “while Thompson’s pyrotechnic pyre last week must be one of the most extravagant and expensive funerals in recent history (price tag: $2.5 million, paid by Johnny Depp, who played Thompson in the film version of “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”), it’s not unusual for people who lived in the limelight to shuffle off this mortal coil in some colorful fashion.”