Only my opinion but there is much one can do without all the .js
I certainly do not need Javascript to fetch some newspaper articles via HTTP.
Dillo is freaking fast, once you try it you start to wonder where the web went all bloated. Of course its layout engine is quite dated, AFAIK no HTML5 support whatsoever and I think there are many layout bugs too. I use it to load up huge static html pages, they just kill Firefox or Chromium on my netbook. It's certainly nicer than lynx, sometimes you want to look at images too.
https://blog.sphere.chronosempire.org.uk/2013/11/26/dillo-a-...
If I need to use a modern web browser on the open web it is generally because I _need_ Javascript. Bank, etc.
Most of the time I can get what I'm after without using a web browser, and when I need to browse HTML I can do it with browser that has no Javascript engine linked in.
It all depends on what the user is trying to do. And not all users are the same.
For retrieving content I find I do not need a web browser.
For reading HTML I find I do not need a Javascript-enabled browser.
Looking at photos is a different task. When I used to use X11, there were a few good options for viewing large number of photos quickly.
Watching video is a different task. For this I prefer a dedicated application. Interestingly enough, the player I use on the iPad has a built-in FTP server, HTTP server... and a web browser. Quite useful.
There was a short time long ago when I used wget. That period did not last very long.
curl is overloaded with "features" I will never use.
My idea of a good TCP client is a small, relatively simple program with few options that compiles quickly and easily.
FreeBSD's fetch utility is another one that comes to mind.
Perhaps counterintuitively, I feel I get more "control" from the simpler TCP clients with fewer options (that I complile myself) than I ever did from the more popular programs with too many options and unneeded libraries linked in by default. But that's just my opinion, nothing more. I would not "recommend" the programs I use to anyone. It is just my personal preference to use them.
[1] http://plan9.bell-labs.com/sources/contrib/maht/rc/httplib.r...
You would have fitted into the plan9 user community in the early 2000s and could still perhaps enjoy it today.
A small subset of us used the name "the Tim Berners-Lee kicking club", in reference to how one man killed the greatest tool ever created by adding a worse one on the top.