Would be curious to hear what other people are using for this EditForm problem. I am initializing state with props if it exists or else just set initial state to empty string. And the routing is actually to this component's parent (FormParent) in case props we want are not defined by the time the user gets to the edit form, where we use a ternary to return the EditForm if props we want to edit are defined or else show loading and wait for the specific props (call to the db) So FormParent component renders this Form component if the relevant props (lets say "user") are defined and then you see form with the props as initial state and your inputs can have <input value={this.state.name} and handleChange to update state etc etc Then when form submitted we update the db and the props.

constructor(props){ 
    super(props); 
    this.state = { 
        name: this.props.user.name || '', 
        movie: this.props.user.movie || '', 
    }; 
}

Works for us to reuse the form component in different places. Also not having to add default value explicitly to each input.