Tahir's character in Iron Man was named Raza, but many people feel that because of The Ten Rings connection, that he could have been set up to play the prominent villain from the comics, The Mandarin. Tahir has even stated in the past that he likes to think that the two characters are linked..maybe one in the same. But he now seems pretty sure that Mandarin will be making an appearance sooner or later...
In an interview with moviefone, Tahir had this to say on the subject..
"At some point, they want to introduce Mandarin into the storyline and my character, like Mandarin, was the leader of the Ten Rings," said Tahir. "We're leaving it open because, partly, it makes good business sense for us to leave a little bit of uncertainty for people to speculate on."
"[Favreau] has known for a long time where he wants to take it and I don't want to speak for him, but my feeling is that the second movie didn't want to just follow a singular storyline. They wanted to expand the characters to show that it's not a linear saga like Lord Of The Rings. There's a linkage somewhere in there, but the big idea is to do at least one more Iron Man! movie and then go into The Avengers!"
Very interesting. Of course, if there is one thing we know on this site, its always to take everything an actor says with a pinch of salt!(Im looking at you Sir Michael) so until any of this is confirmed by Fav himself, treat it as a rumor. I also just realized while reading the article that Tahir played the heroic Captain Robau in J.J. Abram's reboot of
Star Trek!