The Third Doctor is the name given to the third incarnation of the fictional character known as the Doctor; seen on screen in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by actor Jon Pertwee. After the Doctor was found guilty of breaking the Time Lord laws of non-interference and forced to regenerate, he began his third incarnation in exile on 20th century Earth.

The Third Doctor immediately formed a working relationship with the British contingent of UNIT, an international organisation tasked to investigate and defend the Earth against extraterrestrial threats. It was a partnership initially born out of convenience — the Doctor required facilities to try to repair his TARDIS to break the exile, and UNIT needed his expertise to combat the threats they encountered. There is some disagreement about when the Third Doctor's UNIT stories were set, with some evidence that they were contemporary stories set at the same time they were broadcast (the early 70s), and some evidence that they were set in the near future.

According to the production team, there was an intention to set the stories in the near future, but the writers did not always remember this and set the stories in the present.

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