They are real. Supposedly if you soak some moss or lichen, they should come floating out and able to see them under a microscope. As for re-animation, I think that it took the water bears a little bit of time before coming back to normal. I think there was an egg or embryo that came back to life but it took a much longer time than normal, making it seem like it was "taking its time" and slowly "coming back" until it did.
So for now, they were able to make cultured human cells survive 40% more radiation than before using a protein from these little guys. But they can survive thousands times more so there must be more to them.