So, the answer to the title's question is: Yes, the "commander" is the Deadman, but no, the Deadman isn't the commander.

Daiji was surprisingly and disappointingly useless here. Hiromi was useless as well, but he was also crushed with despair by the death of his mentor so I can totally understand why he would react like that. R.I.P. Wakabayashi, who was probably a good and innocent guy based on the few seconds of screentime where he was alive.

It seems pretty inevitable. Julio's main concern has always been for Aguilera's prosperity and he was willing to sacrifice himself for that, so finding out that she also has to be sacrificed to Gif is going to give him second thoughts for sure. Maybe he was also brought in to Deadmans at a very young age and like a lot of cults, they lied to him to ensure his loyalty. Aguilera might even be susceptible to sunken cost fallacy, since the Deadmans has been her entire life.

Someone portrayed by Kiyama Yukiaki, perhaps. :p

If only Kudo had a blue CGI lion so he wouldn't have to touch the floor.

Being a lawyer, it makes sense that he would have such good insight in to Ikki's motivation for heroism. I've always had a feeling that Ikki was trying to overcompensate for a guilty conscience, which would explain why he's so obsessed with protecting his family and Shiawase Yu. He's a control freak who wants to take responsibility for everything and when confronted with that truth, he's not sure what else he can do. This kind of motivation can turn someone in to a villain if they take it too far, like denying someone else credit, so I think it's good for Ikki to acknowledge it here and for Vice to point out that it's okay to think like that as long as it doesn't do any harm. Ikki is a much better person now than he was at the start, when he was inadvertently condescending and overbearing to his siblings, while now he's willing to accept the possibility that maybe the fate of the world doesn't rest on him alone and that other people are capable of doing important things as well.

I like how it's "you must collect 10 Vistamps to get a cool new form" instead of "you must collect 10 Vistamps to advance the plot". I definitely prefer it when the plot is advanced naturally by characters doing things that directly affect the narrative. Although there are also exceptions where the collectibles are part of the plot in their own way, like how the Ghost Eyecons are all people who let their lives burn bright and dispensers of moral advice to reinforce the theme of human connections.

If I'm right about Julio, I don't think it has anything to do with Aguilera's gender, rather the fact that she was raised by Deadmans to become a hedonist and "wife" (sacrifice) for Gif. Julio was also totally surprised to learn the truth about the ceremony, so I think he's equally capable of redemption, maybe even more since he has a more emotional inclination. Either way, Aguilera is a victim of Deadmans' lies and I think she deserves to experience happiness that she was conditioned to dismiss as "false happiness", which was a ploy to keep her loyal to Gif. When in reality, it was Deadmans' happiness that was false.

Remix and Machine parallel:

Not a Remix, but Kujaku is a Longleg.