In all honesty, the live action movie is a true adaptation of the 8 man cartoon, but I think that's the film's downfall. If this was Dragon Ball Z of Street fighter II this pure adaption would be most welcome. Of course to do that it would mean spending hundreds of millions of dollars to arranged the extreme Martial arts action in those films, hence why Dragon ball evolution really blows.
The Ironic twist is that the filmmakers for 8 man did everything right, but it was too right. The anime it was based on was already cheaply animated and looked just like that. Forget the fact that the cartoon is from the 60's It's still weak if you compare it too other anime from that time line, like Gigantor and speed Racer. The film was obviously b-grade cheap, but I feel that using the same tricks that were done in the cartoon made it too cheesy. In their attempt to mimic 8 man's super powers like his speed they did a disservice to it. They should have come up with something else.
You can be respectable to the original content, but still add something new to the content.
Review by bbickley13-921-58664 from the Internet Movie Database.