Re: Error Code: 2027 Malformed packet

[Rick James]

> I just changed each individual table's charset but haven't changed the charset for the database itself

If you are referring to
CREATE TABLE ( ... ) DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8
then that is mostly irrelevant -- it just changes the charset for any _new_ fields you add without an explicit charset.

> is it best practice to have the same charset for tables and the overall db or doesn't it matter?

Again, the DATABASE has a DEFAULT that propagates down to the tables.

Do a SHOW CREATE TABLE -- each column will state explicitly what CHARACTER SET and COLLATION that applies to that column. You may find that your columns are still latin1.

Study
http://mysql.rjweb.org/doc.php/charcoll