Sadly almost totally devoid of historical accuracy

Yes, it has been argued that the portrayal of Nero as a madman and a tyrant isn't true. Just like some people argue that Poppaea, his second wife, wasn't that bad either, despite how she was portrayed later. But nevertheless, it seems like their bad reputation goes very far back. While I can't say exactly how far back, my guess right now would be that it started pretty soon after their deaths. I think you might be right that they didn't do much harm to common people (with the prosecutions of the Christians as a notable exception), but only to the nobility. But still, you don't seem to deny that Nero might have had his own mother and his first wife murdered. I wonder if any other Roman emperor did such a thing! And he also maybe caused Poppaea's death, by kicking her even though she was pregnant until she had a miscarriage.

Henryk Sienkiewicz portrays Nero and Poppaea as villains, yes, but with their reputation, who wouldn't have? And I think "Quo vadis" is a very interesting novel, even though it now has been years since I last read it. While the main characters are nobility or royalty, we also get glimpses of how common people would have lived their lives. I can't help wondering where someone could find information about that back in the 1890s, but Sienkiewicz did a very a good job. He also received the Nobel price of literature in 1905, which I say he really deserved.

Intelligence and purity.

Yes, Nero acquitted himself well during the fire of 64, even opening his palace to those made homeless and organizing food relief, and even Tacitus says the story of him singing "The Sack of Ilium" during the conflagration was a rumor. But he did blame the Christians and use them as torches in his garden and he did build the sumptuous Golden House on land cleared by the fire.

Though he was no Elegabalus, Nero was not one of the better emperors. He likely killed his 14 year old stepbrother Britannicus for fear of his becoming a rival. And once he got rid of Seneca he pretty much lost all interest in governing the empire in favor of a stage career as a singer, which was taken on with such passion that it eclipsed all interest in affairs of state. The British rebellion was handled by his generals, and the major diplomatic triumph with the Armenian-Parthian problem was mainly another excuse to put on a big show in Rome.

His later years found him running around Greece winning every singing contest and even a chariot race that he didn't complete because he was thrown from the chariot. He was ecstatic over these victories and made a triumphant tour of southern Italy on his return, just before his overthrow. He seems to have had an artistic temperament that overrode any interest in the empire. There was an erratic streak in all of the Julio-Claudians and it became more and more pronounced in Nero as time went by.

Now Nero didn't burn Rome? I'll bet it was done for occult purposes. This has been done elsewhere, including Chicago. The city is rebuilt in an occult pattern, to give power to the rulers that be.