deno is a modern Javascript runtime that can run Javascript and Typescript natively. But it is also something that's available to all Python users without the need to install node. Thanks to uv, just run uvx deno and you're all set!

I've used it in a project where I want to have some simple unit tests for Javascript via happy-dom but it's also usable as a task runner via uvx deno task build. It effectively let's you skip the node toolchain for a bunch of simple use-cases, it's great!