putin is trying to revive not the soviet union but rather imperial russia of the tsars

While I generally agree with messages in the interview. I cannot help but notice the overly positive attitude towards Gorbachev (albeit with some nuance):

At the end of the Cold War, Gorbachev played a crucial role. For me, he is truly the hero who helped bring it to an end – not alone, but it was very much a personal matter. He started in 1985, and if we imagine what might have happened if the Soviet Union had continued unchanged, it would have been catastrophic.

Gorbachev believed communism needed reform, thinking it was possible. In my view, we can all be thankful for this misconception. I believe communism couldn’t be reformed, but because he thought it could, he initiated change. Had he believed reform was impossible, he wouldn’t have started at all.

Gorbachev supported the continued occupation of independent countries via the USSR. He also approved of russia's annexation of Crimea. There is a lot more commonality in worldview between putin and Gorbachev than the interview would lead one to believe.

Recognize the goods things that he did, but also recognize that he very much supported the russian genocidal imperialist mindset (that is still widely popular in russia today).