Ballad of the Evernights

Ballad of the Evernights is a fantasy/romantic comedy/adventure feature-length screenplay set within a kingdom of monsters about said kingdom’s demon-hunting vampire prince falling for a demon curse-afflicted spider maiden (a jorogumo of Japanese myth) as he attempts to find a cure for her condition. The story aims to explore agape (self-sacrificial) love through the lens of several monster people’s preconceptions of love being challenged over the span of a year, weaving the fantastical and rom-com elements of the story together to tell a more compelling tale. It possesses a sardonic sense of humor in dealing with the idiosyncrasies present within navigating relationships, romantic or otherwise (but mostly romantic). However, beneath that sarcasm, there lies a sincere, honest, and winsome tale of two very different people being transformed for the better through their love for one another; this is done as a response to modern Disney animated films’ deemphasis on the traditional romance that built their empire. The story follows Charles Evernight, a young (by vampire standards; he’d be on the cusp of turning 18 in human years) vampire prince and demon hunter, as well as his friends Ellawyn (a perky elf sorceress w/ an unrequited crush on Charles) and Gerald (a no-nonsense, terse golem man and Charles’s closest male friend) as they protect their kingdom from attacking demons. However, matters are complicated not only by Charles’s mother putting a hard deadline on when he needs to find a candidate for a queen (something that Charles has little interest in as he deems romance to be not worth his time due to what pain it brought his mother and late father), but the trio discovering a guilt-ridden spider maiden named Arachne plagued by a demonic curse… someone who Charles finds himself attracted to, although he wouldn’t admit it early on.