two stars

Are the ads in the admin panel the only reason it’s “OK”?

No, it is not!
The theme is forcing its paid options in a way that it is repulsive.
It should be possible to remove any advertisement in order to free precious screen area.
The same holds for forcing the builder template as the default template, the user should be able to select the default template freely!. The above are just a couple of the paid version promotions which makes the theme inferior.