Since React isn't the only component based framework, I think there are easier ways to manage and reason about a front end. In fact React works well in certain cases, sure. It's just that any philosophies or paradigms that it introduced are in almost every framework now as an addition, see: NgRedux or Infernal.js.

Personally, React wasn't an easy shift coming from an angular background; I just felt the state flow was cumbersome compared to 2 way data-binding; although some people swear by it and say it's the only way. I think the real take away is that there's plenty of options to choose from.

It's not far off to imagine that React may not be the flavor of the year at some point.