The Dinette Set is a single-panel newspaper comic by artist Julie Larson. Larson's comic began as Suburban Torture in the Los Angeles Reader and other alternative newspapers in 1990. It was then syndicated daily by King Features in 1997; it is currently distributed by GoComics for Universal Uclick. The comic satirizes middle-class culture; its main characters are 50ish sisters Verla Darwin and Joy Penny. The comic pokes fun of middle-class perceptions (and misperceptions) of common, everyday issues.