code: def really_unicode(in_string):
      
      if isinstance(in_string, StringType):
          for args in (('utf-8',), ('latin-1',), ('ascii', 'replace')):
              try:
                  # pylint: disable=star-args
                  in_string = in_string.decode(*args)
                  break
              except UnicodeDecodeError:
                  continue
      if not isinstance(in_string, UnicodeType):
          raise ValueError('%s is not a string at all.' % in_string)
      return in_string
docs: Make a string unicode. Really.
  
      Ensure ``in_string`` is returned as unicode through a series of
      progressively relaxed decodings.
  
      Args:
          in_string (str): The string to convert.
  
      Returns:
          str: Unicode.
  
      Raises:
          ValueError