I gave up on the AMEX 2-4-1 about 3 years ago after having it for about 10 years. It became increasingly difficult to get 2 reward seats to places I wanted to go, at the times I wanted to go. The previous couple of 2-4-1s had been used to IAH as that was the only place in the US that seemed to have good availability. We made our own way on from there.
The taxes and surcharges are now well over £1k for the 2 tickets (to the US)....