Then you can use Livewire, Unpoly, or HTMX. MVC doesn't mean 90s style reloads anymore.

That's what I'm saying: I maintain a complex web app that is built with PHP-templated HTML with jQuery sprinkled in as needed to make things more interactive. It's not perfect, but it's a far cry from the nightmare that people always seem to imagine when they think of "the jQuery days".

Would I use jQuery if I redid it today? No. But this app does prove to me that progressively-enhanced HTML is a valid path to an app today, it doesn't need to be an SPA.