This does not change if you write pure Javascript that directly mutates DOM without calling any intermediate functions.

Given the speed of rendering that browsers achieve, I would say that their call stack during this is highly optimized. I don't see OS doing much at all besides sending the drawing buffers to the GPU.

And also, that with React you are not only buying into React, but also a JavaScript dependency manager/package manager. Be it NPM, or any other. Installing JS package itself already comes with its own problems. And then probably people buy into more stuff to install through that package manager. Some component library and a "router" here, some material style and a little library to wrap the root node with some styling provider or what it is called there, ... before you know it, a typical FE dev will have turned your stack into 80% React and related dependencies and the maintenance on that will continue to grow, as new features "can be solved sooo easily, by just adding another dependency" from the NPM/React world.