False. I read comics with terrible art all the time. I'd be disappointed, just as I was disappointed in Sanders' rendition of Beast, but it's not a total dealbreaker for me.
It's a deal breaker often for me. WIZARD rarely was ever right about anything, but they once made a point about comic art in a magazine. It went along the lines of, good art can make a good story terrific, and even make a terrible story worth looking at; bad art can make a bad story even more horrendous and make a good story look far worse than it is. That's a lot of power over a medium.
It's akin to, imagine you have written the best movie script in the universe. But you have no budget. Your actors are ill cast and garbage at performing. Your location sucks. Your camera work is fuzzy and childish. The script, presented in that form, is worthless.
I would argue it's almost bait and switch to have Cassaday draw the covers of SWORD only for Beast to look in no way feline, or even Earthling. Not as bad as the cover of STRANGE looking like Alex Maleev stuff, and inside it's DOCTOR STRANGE LOVES MARY JANE-esque, but at least Strange doesn't look like a jackrabbit or something.
Without a Beast I can stand reading at panel for panel, SWORD holds no appeal to me. Brand is a cipher of every "tough military lady" since Ripley in ALIEN. Gyrich is fine in a book I am reading already, like AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE, but I wouldn't pay $4 to seek him out. And Lockheed was a Pokemon before POKEMON was a concept, just some annoying little mascot who can't talk.
I saw Ramos' terrible art as a good jumping off point for RUNAWAYS, a book I loved and still read even when it took Whedon & Ryan 14 months to publish six issues. Think SWORD's got a chance with me.
Frankly, expectations for any X-spin-off are so low that anything that isn't dire rubbish is treated like it's Eisner worthy.
