How to properly use unicode in python 2.7?

Question

Python

Something strange is happening, most likely due to the fact that I don’t understand something, so I’m asking for help:
Continuation of the story with journalctl of the ancient version, which in json format gives the following instead of Cyrillic:

"MESSAGE" : "2017-11-28 20:16:06.015  INFO 19853 --- [enerContainer-1] r.p.e.s.i.m.h.s.l.LocalMszPackageHandler : [MSG=d182a0ea-d45f-11e7-a390-7f0ad09e8f90] \uffffffd0\uffffffa1\uffffffd0\uffffffbe\uffffffd1\uffffff85\uffffffd1\uffffff80\uffffffd0\uffffffb0\uffffffd0\uffffffbd\uffffffd0\uffffffb5\uffffffd0\uffffffbd\uffffffd0\uffffffb8\uffffffd0\uffffffb5 \uffffffd0\uffffffbf\uffffffd0\uffffffb0\uffffffd0\uffffffba\uffffffd0\uffffffb5\uffffffd1\uffffff82\uffffffd0\uffffffb0"

By simple logical conclusions, we understand that re.sub('uffffff','x',line) already gives us normal UTF-8.
Further, by the method of magic crutches, we have the following:

>>> line2 = "\xd0\x9e\xd1\x82\xd0\xbf\xd1\x80\xd0\xb0\xd0\xb2\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0 \xd0\xbf\xd0\xbe\xd0\xb4\xd1\x82\xd0\xb2\xd0\xb5\xd1\x80\xd0\xb6\xd0\xb4\xd0\xb5\xd0\xbd\xd0\xb8\xd1\x8f \xd0\xbf\xd1\x83\xd0\xb1\xd0\xbb\xd0\xb8\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0\xd1\x86\xd0\xb8\xd0\xb8"
>>> unicode(line2)
u'\u041e\u0442\u043f\u0440\u0430\u0432\u043a\u0430 \u043f\u043e\u0434\u0442\u0432\u0435\u0440\u0436\u0434\u0435\u043d\u0438\u044f \u043f\u0443\u0431\u043b\u0438\u043a\u0430\u0446\u0438\u0438'
>>> lined = unicode(line2)
>>> print lined
Отправка подтверждения публикации

It would seem chic, we write test code:

...
line = re.sub('uffffff','x',line)
patterns_object = re.search('(((\\\\x[a-f,0-9]{2})+\s*)+)',line)	
if patterns is not None:                                       
    line2 = patterns.group(0)                  
    line3 = unicode(line2)
    print "line:" + line
    print "line3:" + line3

And we have at the output something a little reminiscent of what was above:

line:\xd0\x9e\xd1\x82\xd0\xbf\xd1\x80\xd0\xb0\xd0\xb2\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0 \xd0\xbf\xd0\xbe\xd0\xb4\xd1\x82\xd0\xb2\xd0\xb5\xd1\x80\xd0\xb6\xd0\xb4\xd0\xb5\xd0\xbd\xd0\xb8\xd1\x8f \xd0\xbf\xd1\x83\xd0\xb1\xd0\xbb\xd0\xb8\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0\xd1\x86\xd0\xb8\xd0\xb8 \xd0\xb2 \xd0\x9f\xd0\x9d\xd0\xa1\xd0\x98

line3:\xd0\x9e\xd1\x82\xd0\xbf\xd1\x80\xd0\xb0\xd0\xb2\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0 \xd0\xbf\xd0\xbe\xd0\xb4\xd1\x82\xd0\xb2\xd0\xb5\xd1\x80\xd0\xb6\xd0\xb4\xd0\xb5\xd0\xbd\xd0\xb8\xd1\x8f \xd0\xbf\xd1\x83\xd0\xb1\xd0\xbb\xd0\xb8\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0\xd1\x86\xd0\xb8\xd0\xb8 \xd0\xb2 \xd0\x9f\xd0\x9d\xd0\xa1\xd0\x98

I tried the found options like print(str(b)), print(unicode(b)), print(repr(b)), still the same.
Poke your nose at what I didn’t understand and what should I go to read?

Answer 1

Better just switch to python3, it's less painful

Answer 2

Move to python 3. Because 2.7 won't be supported after 2020.
Numpy is no longer being updated for 2.7 and neither is django.