Doctor Who: The Five Doctors is set in a world inhabited by creatures called Time Lords. Time Lords can live for eons, because when one of their incarnations dies, its body regenerates into a new body that shares a personality with its past forms but has unique characteristics as well. A Time Lord is allowed twelve "regenerations" before he must die permanently. Living a dangerous life, Doctor Who is a Time Lord who has used his incarnations up alarmingly fast. He has already reached his fifth incarnation, known as Doctor Five; his earlier incarnations are known as Doctor One, Doctor Two, Doctor Three, and Doctor Four.

The action takes place primarily in the Death Zone on the Time Lords' home planet, Gallifrey, and in the Dark Tower that houses the tomb of Rassilon, the first of the Time Lords. The Death Zone is a bleak and blasted place...