I don't know why you think React is complex. At its basic form you need to know render method. Its one of the simplist to pickup. I suppose you need to change how you view your page, as a bunch of components instead of dom tags.
I have used it on complex single page app with Flux and without Flux along with simple small components for rails app. Now i don't feel the need to use JQuery but for the very simple single line ops(like hide, show etc). OfCourse i still use JQuery it for ajax.
