Creation
Prince Drufus was created by Scott McCloud for the first color volume of Zot!, in issue 2.
Character Evolution
Drufus does not exhibit any particular sexual attraction or orientation on-panel. However, after a reader wrote into issue 23’s letters page saying that Drufus came across as a gay character, Scott McCloud said that he agreed and confirmed that Drufus is gay.
Major Story Arcs
The Sirius IV Conspiracy
Drufus is the prince of the planet Sirius IV, being the son of the King and Queen and the nephew of ambassador Zarbim.
He is treated poorly by them all. They are emotionally uninvolved with him and constantly push him to be brave, strong, and perfect, none of which he is.
Zarbim is looking for the Golden Key, a sacred object that was stolen from the people of Sirius. Zot and some other heroes are also looking for it. Zarbim pushes Drufus into the hunt.
While tracking the Key’s energy signature, he runs into Zot, a hero also looking for the key. They find out it is inside a virtual reality game. They both enter the game and try to get the Key back from one of the players, but the player escapes. Zot blames the clumsy Drufus.
Drufus meets Zot again back at his house. Vic Taylor, who stole the Key, is also there, but Drufus doesn’t know that. Drufus meets Zot’s friends and family while they try to conceal Vic but eventually they have to break their cover. Just then, Dekko attacks and steals the Key. He blasts Drufus in the process. Drufus is temporarily blinded but otherwise OK. He starts getting really angry at the way everyone treats him.
They all go down to Dekko’s base in Antarctica. They defeat him and get the Key back. However, Vic takes it and goes to Sirius, to open the Doorway at the Edge of the Universe. He leaves a recording saying that a group of conspiracists are planning to use the Key for nefarious means and this is the only way to stop them.
Drufus insists they get the Key before anything else. They arrive on Sirius, where Zarbim is able to exert even more pressure on him. They find Vic but he slips away again. Drufus takes an aircar to chase Vic, but Vic crashes in the desert, as does Drufus.
Drufus is hurt in the crash. He and Vic fight, but also rely on each other. It keeps seeming like Drufus screws everything up, but Vic does too, and Drufus eventually finds a way for them to get some shade, redeeming himself. Vic helps Drufus do some role-play-training to learn to stand up more towards the King and his uncle Zarbim.
Some soldiers finally find him and threaten to kill Vic. Drufus gets in the way of the blast, which mortally wounds him. The soldiers run off. Drufus dies as a hero.
Little does Drufus know, but he is actually the King of Sirius for a short time before he died; his father is assassinated by 9-Jack-9, who was in turn hired by the conspiracy. When Drufus is found dead by some other soldier, his mother becomes Queen.
Zot and Jenny eventually go through the Doorway. They find out that it leads to a future where all the hereos of Sirius who have died have their spirits caught and attached to a robot as a reward for their work. Drufus’s spirit is there among the planet’s heroes.
Zot and Jenny eventually find and defeat the conspiracists.
Alternate Versions
Within the world of “Dimension 10 1/2,” the stick-figure alternate universe created by Matt Feazell and running in the back of the black-and-white issues of Zot!, Drufus goes to a movie about Zot along with his parents and many of the other friends he met from Earth. He checks out some Zot swag.